Neymar’s long road to football transfer history

Neymar’s journey to a recordbreaking transfer fee of $262 million started in a poor district of southern Brazil, a few blocks from the local dump.

A spectacular move from Barcelona to Paris Saint-Germain is expected to be completed this week after the 25-year-old striker and his father met with officials of the Catalan club Wednesday, telling them that Neymar wanted to leave.

The son of a journeyman soccer player for Brazil’s smallest teams, Neymar was born in the industrial city of Mogi das Cruzes, some 60 kilometers north of Sao Paulo, the country’s biggest metropolis.

He never settled there, as his father’s career as a striker and family breadwinner meant they were always moving on.

When Neymar was 6, the family moved in with his grandmother in Sao Vicente, a beach town 50 kilometers south of Sao Paulo. And when his sister Rafaella was born, the family moved again, this time to a bigger house in Jardim Gloria, a district in the poorer city of Praia Grande. Both homes were within reach of Santos, the Brazilian club made world famous by Pele and where the youngster first known as Juninho would start his own soccer career.

While his family was anything but wealthy, Juninho was the richest kid around at Jardim Gloria.

Neymar’s house was properly built, not a shack like those of many of his school friends. His street was properly paved and allowed him to play barefoot all day long, though he didn’t have to walk far to find dirt roads surrounded by wild vegetation. While other kids were lucky to have many toys, he had 50 footballs in his home collection at age 14. He even had a video game, which was a dream for most of his neighbours.