Neymar, Santos, and the Art of Football
Why we should all be rooting for Neymar
In Santos, Brazil, the surfers move gracefully, carving through the waves with effortless precision. As a swell approaches, they spring to life, popping onto their boards and leaning into turns as they glide along the curling walls of water. The most graceful surfers ride relaxed, flowing with the rhythm of the ocean.
In 2009, a 17-year-old known as Neymar Jr. stepped on the field as a professional for the first time for Santos FC. Over the years, his legend grew as his skills and flair had the same effortless movement as Santos’ surfers.
After a career in Europe (any kid in the world would dream of) and a forgetful stint in Saudi Arabia, the 33-year-old Neymar is back at his hometown club, Santos FC. Maybe the fanfare and expectations aren’t the same as Cristiano Ronaldo returning to Old Trafford, but to the romantics, it’s all the same.
Neymar’s contract only goes through June, so his time back at Santos could be short-lived. It was recently reported that Barcelona may be interested in his services once again. We are all hoping he can revive his career and going back to Barcelona would be a step in the right direction.
Based on the last few weeks, we can acknowledge that he still has at least some of his powers. His recent olimpico is a glimpse of that. With that said, there is no denying he is in the twilight of his career.
The Underachiever
Much has been written and discussed about Neymar and how he fell short of expectations. He was dubbed the chosen one to take the reins from Ronaldo Nazario as the next great Brazilian footballer. Neymar was supposed to lead his country to a World Cup victory, just like so many of his predecessors. He was expected to be the next Brazilian Ballon d'Or winner, but the best he ever finished was third.
Despite all the unmet milestones, if you were to ask Neymar if he felt he has had a successful career, I’m pretty sure he would smile and say he was satisfied. He has won 30 trophies and counting throughout his career. He is a top 50 goal scorer ever while also being the top goal scorer from Brazil. He’s one of the few players to ever score 100 goals for three different clubs. He will go down as a top 10 player of his generation. He has also earned enough to take care of multiple generations of families. And yet, critics are still disappointed by his output.
But what critics forget is that Neymar packaged his game up and delivered it to us beautifully. In an era when criticism has been hurled at football’s new systematic and conservative approach, Neymar was the opposite. His game reminds us of an era almost all but gone from today’s game. To understand Neymar’s flair and attractive playing style, you first have to understand Santos FC.
The Santos Way
I have previously written about football in Brazil. The colorful corridors of Brazilian streets perfectly sum up the Brazilian style of football. They play with purpose and personality. They play an attacking style and take on defenders 1v1. In a sense, Santos represents Brazil’s football identity. Such is the case because of the stars that have come out of the club.
The most famous Santos-produced player is Pelé. Widely known as the best footballer until Lionel Messi stepped onto the field, Pelé was synonymous with Santos from 1956 to 1974. Pelé helped Santos dominate Brazilian football and popularized the phrase, “Jogo Bonito,” meaning, “The Beautiful Game.”
During Pelé’s dominance with attractive attacking football, Santos won trophy after trophy, even traveling the world to play on various continents, which helped globalize Santos’ style of play.
Santos’ reputation for producing carefree attacking footballers has continued to today’s generation. Players such as Robinho and Rodrygo have enjoyed success in Europe, but none have the trophy case of accomplishments like Neymar.
Attacking football. Winning trophies. Brazilian flair. Those were the things that Santos FC represents. Then Pelé passed away in 2022. And with him, the powers of Santos also died. In 2023, everything fell apart. For the first time in 111 years, Santos was relegated to Brazil’s second division.
As The Athletic reported, fans and former players were devastated. Wrote Walter Casagrande, a former Brazilian striker, “This is a blow to everyone who loves football. Everyone has a soft spot for Santos.”
A former teammate of Pele’s wrote, “I am incredulous. I thought the gods of football would protect us.”
It is hard to comprehend a team like Santos being relegated. It’s like the New York Yankees being relegated to Triple-A. It just sounds absurd, but it happened to Santos.
Said one columnist of Santos’ relegation, “The only consolation is that Pele is not around to see this.”
Luckily for football fans everywhere, Santos was promoted after spending only one season in Série B—and that set the stage for Neymar’s return.
Neymar’s Last Hurrah
Let me get it out of the way—Neymar did not come back to Santos to bring back footballing magic to his former club. Signing such a short-term contract tells us as much.
Neymar’s motivations are surely to get back in shape to make a last World Cup run next summer and hopefully secure a new contract in Europe. But the fact that Neymar did return to Santos with the chance to restore glory to the club while also chasing personal goals is an all-too-perfect storybook tale.
Only time will tell whether Neymar revitalizes his career to a point where he can make a positive impact in Europe or in the World Cup. If things don’t work out for him over the next 16 months, his critics will have even more mud to throw on his resume of underachievements. Much has been said about Brazil’s lack of success at the National Team level over the last decade. That lack of success also coincides with when Neymar was at the peak of his powers.
Maybe the beautiful game has passed by the way Brazilians and Neymar play. Maybe systematic football revolutionized by Pep Guardiola has figured out how to stifle the creativity of players such as Neymar enough that he is now relegated to playing out his days in Brazil.
But even if that is the case, we should still celebrate his career. One that fills YouTube with highlights we rarely see in today’s game, Neymar may be the last of a dying breed of footballers. Haters will continue to mock Neymar’s career, but once he’s gone, we’ll all wish for him and what he represents to return.
Great read. It does frustrate me when people talk about Neymars as if it's some sort of disappointment. One of the best players I've ever watched, but still, the move to PSG was ultimately the wrong move to make, despite scoring plenty of goals and winning all those trophies. Would be great for him to have one last hurrah in the next World Cup
When young Neymar had the ball, his defender's girlfriend looked away.