Santos
After joining the squad in 2003,[2] Neymar eventually made his Santos debut against Oeste on 7 March 2009 in a 2-1 win at the age of 17, Neymar's next appearance was against Mogi Mirim a week later, during which he scored his first goal for Santos. He is considered to be one of the most exciting young talents ever to come out of South America. [3] On 11 April 2009, in the 2009 Campeonato Paulista semi-final first leg against Palmeiras, Neymar scored the decisive goal in a 2-1 win at Estádio Vila Belmiro. [4] In the final however, Neymar failed to perform to his full ability, and Santos crashed out to Corinthians in a 4-2 aggregate loss. [5]
Neymar's performances for Santos and his likeliness to Brazilian idols such as Robinho and Pelé,[6] the former whom he currently plays alongside at Santos, began to attract interest from many clubs such as Manchester City,[7] Internazionale,[6] Real Madrid,[6] and Chelsea,[8] with Real Madrid even going so far as to claim that they had signed a pre-contract agreement with Neymar's agent, Wagner Ribeiro,[3] which Santos fervently denied.[9] Following this, Santos slapped an asking price of €30 million on the player's head,[3] and tied Neymar down to a new contract lasting until December 2014.[10] Neymar himself said he didn't think it was time to leave Santos, and that he was only focused on the club.[11]
On 15 April 2010, Neymar scored 5 goals for Santos in a 8-1 routing of Guarani in the round of 16 of the Brazilian Cup.[12] Following the 2010 Campeonato Paulista in which Neymar scored 14 goals in 19 games,[2] the club were crowned champions after a 5-5 aggregate win over Santo André in the finals.[13] Neymar was given the award for the best player, due to his brilliant performances in the competition.[1