Neymar shared pictures of his injured ankle on Instagram, two days after being taken off in Brazil’s opening World Cup game.
Neymar watched the final 10 minutes of Brazil’s win from the sidelines as they walk over Serbia.
The 30-year-old PSG forward was substituted with ten minutes remaining of his country’s 2-0 win over Serbia on Thursday with a nasty knock.
The Paris Saint-Germain forward has been undergoing physiotherapy treatment since the injury. He also had a small bone trauma on the same foot after being roughed up by the Serbia defense from the start.
He was fouled nine times, the most by any player at the World Cup in the first set of matches in the group stage.
And with the key man ruled out for the rest of the group stages, he’s taken to social media to share images of the damage, revealing a visibly swollen and sore ankle, and another picture showing his leg inside a protective material.
He remains upbeat, however, captioning the post ‘Boraaaa!!!’, which translates to ‘Let’s go!’.
Neymar is resting and recovering in the Brazil camp, with hopes that he will return for the latter stages of the competition to help his teammates secure their place in the last 16.
He has six goals in World Cup history and will be hoping to claim more during the knockout phase once he recovers from the ankle issue.
His 2014 World Cup in his home country was ruined by a back fracture and Brazil was also underwhelmed in 2018. But with the Selecao coming into this tournament as one of the favourites, many tipped Neymar to finally steal the show on the world stage with his mesmeric talent.
Brazil faces Switzerland and Cameroon in their remaining Group G fixtures in the week to come, but they will have to cope without their defender Danilo, who also suffered a similar knock in the Serbia win.
Rodrigo Lasmar, the team doctor for Brazil, said: ‘Neymar and Danilo went through an MRI on Friday afternoon and we found ligament damage in the ankle of both of them.
‘It is important to be calm and evaluate day by day. The idea is to recover them for the rest of the competition.’
Brazil’s match on Monday will sees them try to defeat the Swiss at Stadium 974, the site of Portugal’s win over Ghana and France’s win over Denmark.
Neymar’s previous World Cups have been hit by injury issues as well, missing the 2014 semi-final with a back fracture, and having fitness issues in the build-up to the 2018 tournament in Russia.
The 30-year-old Neymar is second on Brazil’s scoring list with 75 goals, two behind Pelé’s record with the national team. He helped the “Seleção” win the 2013 Confederations Cup and its first Olympic gold medal at the 2016 Rio de Janeiro Games, but is yet to win a major title with Brazil.
Brazil coach Tite has yet to announce who will replace Neymar while he is unavailable. Tite also will miss right-back Danilo, who hurt his ankle against Serbia.
Brazil, seeking its first World Cup title in two decades, faces Cameroon in its last group match. It can reach the round of 16 with a win on Monday if Cameroon doesn’t defeat Serbia in the other group match.
