Neym and shame him – greed is not good!

deal is making 263 times the impact. And Neymar is a much better player – on the podium with Lionel Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo.

What’s more, at 25 he is young enough to be around for the long haul – or until someone else comes in and makes an offer his dad can’t refuse.

What cannot be ignored is that for all Qatar’s money, Neymar could have said ‘no’. He had only just signed a new deal with Barca, was a member of El Tridente, perhaps the most breathtaking front three in football history, and had as good an understanding off the field as on it with Messi and Luis Suarez.

It was the stuff every boy dreams about and more. And a lot to give up for pieces of silver.

And for PSG? As previously mentioned, they are a thrusting, young, medium-tolarge fish in a modest and otherwise docile pool. As a football institution, compared to “More than a Club” Barcelona, they are at the gold tap stage.

In terms of history, legends and silverware, they aren’t fit to clean the Nou Camp toilets.

All of which makes the idea that Neymar wanted to step out of Messi’s shadow faintly ludicrous – playing in Ligue Un backwaters, he will be an awful lot further from the sun.

However this is dressed up, it looks like a move from Gordon Gecko’s “Greed is good” handbook. Neymar will trouser a huge chunk and so will his dad, who, remember, was involved in the sleazy deal that took his son from Santos to Barca in the first place.

As well as “coffee money” amounting to tens of millions, there

were allegations of orgies from the Santos president – and they haven’t been refuted.

Neymar’s entourage certainly haven’t endeared themselves to anyone in Catalonia with their crass behaviour – indeed, players who had pleaded with him to stay were glad to see the back of him in the end.

Just as we know why the Qatari owners made the move, we know why Neymar wouldn’t listen to reason, to Messi himself, or the club and its hundreds of thousands of beseeching socios: he listened to his greedy dad, his pals and Gecko.

And by doing so, he dragged the beautiful game closer to the gutter. Televisions are already being turned off, tickets not renewed and, oh, whatever happened to Financial Fair Play?

If it has even crossed PSG’s mind, it will require footwork every bit as fancy as their new recruit’s to wangle their way around it.

You could argue that it says a lot about football’s stature that a country is staking so much of its reputation on the game. But you could also argue that football’s own reputation is in danger.

Just like the week’s other pigs-at-thetrough event, if the game is not careful, it could become another overhyped, over-paid turn-off like Mayweather vs McGregor. And the greed of one its greatest modern players will have helped put it

there.