Search

21 Feb 2026

Neymar ponders retirement – but is determined to make Brazil World Cup squad

Neymar ponders retirement – but is determined to make Brazil World Cup squad

Brazil forward Neymar is “living year to year” as he considers retirement at the end of the season.

The 34-year-old currently plays for boyhood club Santos, where he joined from Saudi club Al-Hilal last year, and hopes to play for his country in this summer’s World Cup.

He has suffered from injury problems in recent years, most recently a knee injury, but is under contract for the rest of 2026.

“I don’t know what will happen from now on, I don’t know about next year,” he told Brazilian channel Caze.

“It may be that when December comes, I’ll want to retire. I’m living year to year now.

“We will see what my heart decides. It depends on what my heart says later in the year.

“This year is a very important year, not only for Santos, but also for the Brazilian national team, as it’s a World Cup year, and for me too. I wanted to play this season totally 100 per cent.”

Neymar, who is Brazil’s leading scorer of all time with 79 goals in 128 caps, has played at three World Cups.

To continue reading this article,
please subscribe and support local journalism!


Subscribing will allow you access to all of our premium content and archived articles.

Subscribe

To continue reading this article for FREE,
please kindly register and/or log in.


Registration is absolutely 100% FREE and will help us personalise your experience on our sites. You can also sign up to our carefully curated newsletter(s) to keep up to date with your latest local news!

Register / Login

Buy the e-paper of the Donegal Democrat, Donegal People's Press, Donegal Post and Inish Times here for instant access to Donegal's premier news titles.

Keep up with the latest news from Donegal with our daily newsletter featuring the most important stories of the day delivered to your inbox every evening at 5pm.