Neymar was my idol when he was growing up rather than Lionel Messi, Lamine Yamal has said. He recently had his say while speaking to the press, and fans have been reacting.
According to him, it was incredible watching Neymar play at Santos and Barcelona at a very young age, and he has been his idol in football ever since.
Yamal added that while Messi also did amazing things at his current club, Neymar was the one who inspired him.
His words, “I was five years old when I saw him at Santos, but seven years old when I saw him in person at FC Barcelona at the Camp Nou. It was incredible to see him. Yes, it’s true that (Lionel) Messi was there who was also incredible, but he was something totally different. Neymar has always been my idol. He’s a star, a football legend.”
WOW.
Neymar da Silva Santos Júnior (born 5 February 1992), known as Neymar Júnior or mononymously as Neymar, is a Brazilian professional footballer who plays as a forward for Saudi Pro League club Al Hilal and the Brazil national team. A prolific goalscorer and playmaker, he is widely regarded as one of the best players in the world and the best Brazilian player of his generation. Neymar has scored at least 100 goals for three different clubs, making him one of the few players to achieve this feat.
Neymar came into prominence at Santos, where he made his professional debut aged 17. Soon becoming the Brazilian’s league star player, he won the 2011 Copa Libertadores, being Santos’ first since 1963. He was named the South American Footballer of the Year in 2011 and 2012, and relocated to Europe to join Barcelona in 2013.
In his second season, as part of Barcelona’s attacking trio with Lionel Messi and Luis Suárez, dubbed MSN, he won the continental treble of La Liga, the Copa del Rey, and the UEFA Champions League. Motivated to be the focal player at club level, Neymar unexpectedly transferred to Paris Saint-Germain (PSG) in 2017 for €222 million, which made him the most expensive player ever. In his debut season, he excelled in French football, winning the league title and being voted Ligue 1 Player of the Year.
Despite recurring injuries in Paris, he helped PSG attain an historic domestic quadruple in the 2019–20 season, during which the club also reached its first ever Champions League final, with Neymar being named in the UEFA Team of the Year for the second time in his career.
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