A Russian club missed the chance to sign Neymar for 10m euros

Former President of Lokomotiv (Moscow) Nikolay Naumov unveiled an interesting story about Brazil`s superstar Neymar, whom Paris Saint-Germain bought for a record 222 million euros from Barcelona in the summer of 2017. Naumov said in an interview with Sport-Express that 10 years ago the Russian club could buy a Brazilian striker (then 16-year-old) for 10 million euros. The railroads, however, eventually renounced this option and decided to place their younger player Alan Gatagov. In 2008, the teenage team of Lokomotiv lost to the final of the Youth Cup of Santos with the 16-year-old Neymar and Philippe Coettinho.




We wondered whether it was worth attracting him or not. We wanted to buy it. Our scouts were watching Neymar. There were great doubts. First, he was too young. Secondly, it was not clear how he would adapt to Russia. He was too fragile and weak. After all, we decided not to buy it. It would probably cost us about 10 million euros. Such a sum for such a young player coming from another continent should be careful with these things. Yes, we lost the final but I did not notice Neymar showing a better game predicted by napoli europa league than the rest. Alan Gatagov looked just as good, explained former Russian boss Loko (Moscow) before the Russian edition.

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