NEYMAR IS BRAZIL SAVIOUR:
Neymar is daring to dream of ultimate glory to heal his nation’s wounds and help repair his tarnished reputation
PHILIPPE COUTINHO sat in ignorance of the impending threat at the end of Brazil’s training session on Tuesday.
To his right was former Chelsea rival Willian, to his left Manchester City’s Gabriel Jesus. He was among friends, or so he thought.
Approaching from the rear was Neymar, out of sight but with mischief in mind. ‘Danger here,’ George Hamilton might say. The Paris Saint-Germain superstar clutched a handful of eggs while Willian and Jesus both had flour at the ready.
Coutinho was clueless, his usual sense for menace deserting him in a relaxed state. Neymar arrived and, without hesitation, cracked the eggs over the Barcelona playmaker’s head. Before he knew any better, Willian and Jesus jumped to their feet in perfect synchronisation to thrust flour in his face. It would appear that manager Tite has the squad so perfectly drilled since taking over from Dunga two years ago that even their pranks are expertly executed.
Coutinho turned 26 on Tuesday and this was how the squad chose to mark the occasion. He took the joke (yoke, even) in good spirits and Neymar was in his element as he celebrated a job well done with puppet-master Marcelo. But the tables quickly turned. The Real Madrid full back got a hold of Neymar in what can best be described as an atomic wedgie grip, resulting in his former Barcelona foe flailing about on the turf. The leftover flour, eggs and water quickly found its way into his freshly-coloured blonde highlights.
Like Coutinho, Neymar had no option but to take such ignominy on the chin (literally) although it is hard to imagine such retalia- tion being tolerated by the Brazilian had he been on club duty.
He appears to operate in a paradoxical state of mind for his country.
After all, Neymar decided against returning to Paris to see his teammates clinch the French league title in April, instead remaining in Sao Paulo recovering from the metatarsal injury which had ruled him out of the final three months of the campaign, and he only checked back in with his club in May.
This is a World Cup Neymar was never going to miss for something as frivolous as some dead rubber games in Ligue 1 — especially after suffering a broken bone in his back in the quarter-final four years ago and being forced to watch in horror and astonishment along with the rest of the world as Germany thrashed Brazil 7-1 in Belo Horizonte to reach the final.
‘I would love to play the game again with me on the pitch. I am sure the result would have been different,’ he said this week.
Russia offers Neymar a chance of salvation, an opportunity to dazzle and enthral on the biggest stage of all having flopped in the Champions League with PSG — where he only moved in order to become a standalone star worthy of the biggest individual prize of all, the Ballon d’Or.
His season-ending injury struck in between legs of the 5-2 defeat to Real Madrid in the Round of 16, but his reputation had already taken a battering following a world-record €222 million transfer from Barcelona.
The financial figures are astronomical — a weekly wage of more than €600,000 over five years — but Neymar has basically been irrelevant since departing the Nou Camp.
He is at the centre of a circus of his own making in Paris but that perception can change over the next four weeks, starting against Switzerland in Rostov tomorrow. While Messi and Ronaldo — the game’s two modern greats — are charged with inspiring relative outsiders to glory, the stage is set for Neymar to outshine them.
He has the platform to do so as the ultimate maestro in a Brazil team filled with attacking prowess — although it will have irked Tite that a friend of Gabriel Jesus seemingly leaked his starting XI on Instagram before deleting the post.
Since Tite took the helm in June 2016, the Selecao have played 21 games; won 17, lost once, drawn three, scored 47 goals and conceded just five.
Jesus has netted the most (10), Neymar is next with eight while Barca’s Paulinho, formerly of Tottenham Hotspur is on seven.
‘I don’t know Neymar’s limits,’ Tite said after Brazil’s final warmup game against Austria in which he netted a brace last weekend. ‘His technical and creative capacity is impressive. When we get him in the last third of the field he is lethal.’
Neymar’s double meant he drew level with Romario on 55 goals in Brazil’s all-time scoring tanks and is now chasing Ronaldo (62) and Pele (77). At only 26, it seems certain that he will eventually be out on his own, but he will need a World Cup success to class himself among those in the pantheon.
‘You have to trust, you dream,’ Neymar explained. ‘You can talk, you’re Brazilian and you can dream; we’re dreaming more and more. Dreaming is not forbidden.’
After the nightmare of four years ago, Brazil can dare to do so once again. Neymar is the one who can help a country heal while repairing his own reputation.