Peter Henry
Former Barcelona, Manchester United and Celtic striker Henrik Larsson reckons Neymar’s decision to leave the Nou Camp last summer and join French side PSG has affected the Brazilian’s game for the worse.
To be fair to Neymar he only recovered from a serious ankle injury just before this summers World Cup in Russia, so it is a little understandable that he has not yet quite hit the heights of form that made PSG smash the World Transfer Record and fork out £200 million to sign him from Barcelona.
However, when asked whether playing in a so called lesser league like Ligue 1 has affected Neymar’s form, former Sweden striker Larsson agreed:
“Yeah but also I think his quickness of thought isn’t really there at the moment,” Larsson told ITV.
“Every time the ball is coming to him, he stops it. He’s never taking it on when the ball is running.
“So he has to make the decisions a little bit quicker because the people are going to come a bit quicker to him here now when we’re playing in the World Cup maybe than they do when they play in his league.”
Neymar did however, but on his best display so far at this World Cup, he scored the decisive opening goal in Brazil’s 2-0 victory over Mexico on Monday afternoon, a result which means the Selecao will now face Belgium in a mouthwatering quarter final clash next Friday night.