Neymar Undergoes Knee Surgery in Final Push for World Cup

Neymar Jr is running out of World Cups. He knows it. Brazil knows it. So the Santos forward has gone back to the operating theatre, gambling that one more procedure now might buy him one last shot on the biggest stage of all.

Santos coach Cuca revealed before his side’s Copa Sudamericana opener against Cuenca that Neymar recently had knee surgery during the FIFA international break and has been away from training while he recovers.

“Neymar underwent knee surgery during the FIFA international break. He hasn’t trained. He spent a few days recovering from the operation,” Cuca said, outlining a plan that has been months in the making.

At the end of the last Brazilian league season, Neymar opted for knee surgery on medical advice, an attempt to stabilise a joint that has taken a brutal beating over the years. That was supposed to be the reset. It was not enough.

So he has gone back for more.

According to reports in Spain, just a few months after that first operation, Neymar has again returned to the operating room, this time for regenerative treatment using platelet-rich plasma. The objective is clear: strengthen the damaged tissue in a knee that has become both his greatest concern and his biggest obstacle.

This is not a cosmetic procedure. It is a player fighting the clock.

Neymar had hoped to spend this international break with the Brazil squad. Instead, he chose the clinic over the camp, aware that every decision between now and next summer will be judged against a single question: can he be fully fit for what is expected to be his final World Cup?

He has now begun a tailored recovery programme designed to have him peaking in the last months before the tournament in the United States, Mexico and Canada. Every session, every day of rehab, is aimed at the same target: convincing Brazil coach Carlo Ancelotti that he deserves one of the 26 seats on the plane.

For a decade, Brazil built around Neymar. Now, as a new generation emerges, he is the one trying to prove he still belongs at the heart of the project.

The knee will decide how that story ends.