The 'curse' that prevented Neymar from competing with Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo

This Tuesday the Brazil National Team suffered a tough defeat against Uruguay at the Centenario stadium in Montevideo. It was 2-0 by goals from Darwin Nunez and Nicolas De La Cruz, in a night in which Fernando Diniz's team showed a disappointing performance that caused concern among fans and criticism from the press.

But the defeat was not the worst news for them: Neymar Jr, the team's star player, had to be replaced in the last minutes of the first half due to severe pain in his knee. After the match, the doctor, Rodrigo Lasmar, gave a press conference and said: "We did all the tests. These will be repeated tomorrow (Wednesday). The 24 hours will be important to see how the knee will respond, the swelling it will present and the imaging tests that will define a definitive diagnosis. It is too early to say".

Pending the results, that could bring very bad news, what is certain is that the forward will be off the field for some time. Sadly this is something he is already used to, as in recent years he has had physical problems that have prevented him from playing regularly for club and country.

In the last 7 seasons he has suffered 16 injuries, which added together give a total of 640 days off the field recovering. The most serious were two fractures in his right foot, in 2018 and 2019, a right ankle fracture prior to Copa America 2019 and another ankle surgery in February this year that prevented him from playing the last few months at Paris Saint-Germain.

He could have been even better

No one would dare dispute Neymar's talent. For more than a decade he has been one of the most important forwards in the world and, in fact, he is the most expensive player of all time: adding together his Santos-Barcelona; Barcelona-PSG and PSG-Al-Hilal transfers, he has cost more than $400 million. But recurring injuries prevented him from competing with Cristiano Ronaldo and Lionel Messi. In fact, he was never able to win the Ballon d'Or or The Best award.