ANALYSIS
222 million euros and a question: three years after his pharaonic transfer to Paris Saint-Germain, has Neymar reached the level so hoped for by a whole club and his city? In view of his capital performance against Leipzig, in the semi-final of the Champions League, there is little doubt. At 28, the Brazilian finally meets the immense expectations placed in him. And the sparkling form of the playmaker comes at the best time for the Parisians, who qualified for the final of the competition for the first time in their history.
>> LIVE - Relive the Champions League semi-final between Paris and Leipzig (3-0)
There were these affronts to wash away. Two missed European campaigns, in 2018 and 2019, in which his injuries prevented Paris from performing well in knockout matches. Was he going to get hurt again in the "money time" of this season truncated by the coronavirus crisis? Fall back into his individualistic failures without helping his own to climb the double level of the eighth and quarter-finals?
Decisive leader
The Neymar 2020 Champions League version is very different. Author of two goals in the double-confrontation against Dortmund, impactful and inspired against Atalanta Bergamo, the "Ney" was again decisive in the large victory against Leipzig. "He took responsibility," summed up the former Parisian Jimmy Algerino at the microphone of Europe 1, after the meeting.
" We are not the first nor the last team to fail to defend against Neymar "It is first a fault on him which allows the Parisians to open the scoring at the start of the meeting. On the second goal, his acrobatic heel on a Paredes cross gave Di Maria plenty of time to adjust the German goalkeeper perfectly. Tuesday evening, Neymar tirelessly provoked, dribbled and passed against Germans unable to thwart the Auriverde metronome. "We are not the first nor the last team to fail to defend against Neymar," German coach Julian Nagelsmann admitted at a press conference. "It's like that, you have to accept it."
"Phenomenal combativity"
Admittedly, the Brazilian did not score. There are these two posts in the first period, this tense strike passed by a hair to the side at half an hour of play or even this failed recovery at the end of the match. But where Neymar sometimes fished out of gluttony, in the summer of 2020 only a desire to break the lines and find his partners distinguished. To serve the game, in short.
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"I really liked Neymar's phenomenal fighting spirit and his behavior in this 'Final 8'", greeted Guy Roux on Europe 1 a few minutes after the final whistle. "All the criticisms, justified, that he had lately on his injuries and his behavior, are erased", continued Jimmy Algerino. "The reasons he came to PSG have come to fruition."
A goal to fulfill
To tell the truth, all is not yet "concretized", as the consultant of Europe 1 says: it remains with the Parisians a match to play, vis-a-vis Lyon or Bayern Munich, to hope to become champions of Europe. Neymar, more than the other Parisians, will be expected at the turn for the most important meeting in the history of PSG, Sunday.
"My goal is to win the Champions League," he confided in August 2017, when putting on the Parisian colors for the first time. After so many years, hardships and battles, a new recital of the "Ney" vintage 2020 would transform its very irregular path into a road to triumph.