The Neymar-Unai Emery player coach relationship was never going to run smooth. Emery has a history of overbearing man-management.
This is the coach who used to give his players a pen-drive on the eve of every match so they could study their direct rivals and when he suspected one player was not watching the video files, tricked him by giving him a blank pen-drive and then quizzing him about the contents.
French defender Jeremy Mathieu fell into the trap: ‘Yes boss very helpful’.
Neymar has made an instant impression on the pitch at PSG with 11 goals in 12 games
The Brazilian’s relationship with the Paris Saint-Germain boss Unai Emery has become strained
The forward missed PSG’s match on Saturday through injury but trained with Brazil on Tuesday
Emery is as smart as he is intense, so he will not have been handing Neymar information packs on the next defenders he is going to come up against.
But he is still very hands-on and if Paris Saint-Germain’s all-time record signing becomes kingmaker at the club then it will not be the Basque coach he favours.
Emery has never had to a handle a dressing room full of such high-earning players before and he is also in no position to question Neymar’s commitment because he failed in Ligue 1 and in the Champions League last season.
He finds himself in a position of weakness – the world record signing is beyond his reproach.
Privately Emery sees Neymar’s antics over Edinson Cavani’s penalty-taking duties as completely against all he believes in. There is also a suspicion that this season Neymar will pick his games in the domestic calendar so as to rest before Champions League games and Brazil internationals this season.
Neymar was involved in a very public dispute with Edinson Cavani over penalty-taking duties
The Brazil star shakes hands with Cristiano Ronaldo at the Best FIFA awards last month
Neymar knows he is not going to win the Ballon d’Or by lifting the Ligue 1 title at PSG
He is not going to win the Ballon d’Or by winning Ligue 1, he needs to win the World Cup and the Champions League for that.
With PSG likely to win the league without breaking sweat, rotation makes some sense but it will weaken Emery’s position in the eyes of the rest of the players if it is not him deciding who rests and when.
France’s most important sports paper L’Equipe has written of an ‘abyss’ between Neymar and the coach – as with Neymar’s spat with Cavani, there will only be one winner if things come to a head.
Cavani is playing better than ever. Everything he touches flies past the keeper and with Uruguay’s other main striker Luis Suarez struggling for goals, his international team-mate has suddenly become the country’s most important player going into next year’s World Cup.
‘I’m sure they will sort it out,’ Suarez said of Cavani and Neymar’s disagreement. He has a better relationship with the Brazilian than with his compatriot.
Neymar celebrates with team-mate Kylian Mbappe during a win over Metz in September
Neymar has already struck up a devastating relationship with his fellow strike partners
He misses his old Barcelona pal and he also disputes that Neymar is regretting leaving Barca for France.
‘I have heard people say that he regrets leaving. But there is nothing in it,’ he told Sport this week.
‘Ney is mature enough to come out and say so himself if that were the case. It wouldn’t be necessary for other people to say it.’
But in the past, smoke and mirrors, and whispered rumours that are later denied is exactly how things have panned out. Neymar was happy at Barcelona – happy enough to sign a long new contract in 2016.
And there was no real public declaration to the contrary until he had his PSG No 10 shirt on.
Stories accredited to Le Parisien were published in Spain last month claiming Neymar enjoys certain privileges at the club – ranging from the understandable to the apparently ridiculous.
He has his own physios in Paris and neither Rafael Martini nor Ricardo Rosa treat any other players. Zlatan Ibrahimovic brought his personal physio too but he attended other PSG stars.
Neymar swapped Barcelona for PSG in an astonishing world-record £198m move in August
Former team-mate Luis Suarez believes there is no truth that Neymar regrets leaving Barca
Neymar is the only player who doesn’t have to travel with official club hand luggage. He has his own preferred brands and he continues to use them.
He has permission to not track back during games and other players have been told not to go in hard on him in training. All this according to reports in Spain sourcing French media.
When he sat out PSG’s last league game before the international break it was another suggestion that he is calling the shots. PSG had no problem beating Angers without him.
If in the games that do provide a stiffer test it is Neymar who steps-up then everyone will be happy. But so much about the biggest transfer in history suggests staying for the entire length of his contract is not in the player’s mind.
The Real Madrid rumours that have surfaced this week are also part and parcel of the whole Neymar package – the baggage that goes with the third best player on the planet.
Sergio Ramos was happy to add his contribution. ‘I like to have the best and it’s clear Neymar is one of them,’ he said.
Sergio Ramos has opened the door for Neymar to leave PSG for Real Madrid in the future
Real Madrid became interested in the 25-year-old when he was a teenager at Santos
It was a reminder that Real Madrid wanted Neymar when he was a teenager at Santos and that now with a 33-year-old Ronaldo on just one league goal for the season there is greater need than ever for another superstar signing.
Madrid were half expecting Ronaldo to move to PSG last summer. And if that deal had happened they would have paid Neymar’s buy-out clause. PSG spoilt the plan by going for the Brazilian themselves.
‘Maybe it was easier for him to go to PSG, instead of directly to Real Madrid,’ added Ramos mischievously in his interview with Spanish radio Cadena Ser.
‘You never know what can happen in football. I already have the door open for him if he wants to come. I also have a good relationship with him.’
Neymar would certainly have lost all credit in Barcelona if he had switched straight to the capital.
Neymar grabs the Barcelona badge during their comeback win over PSG in March
Neymar walked away from Barca despite being part of an incredible front-line
With 11 goals in 12 starts Neymar has got off on the right foot on the pitch. But relationships with his coach and strike partner might lead to ‘either he goes or I do’ situations further down the line.
And if demotivation really has set in three months into his first season then is there really any chance of him seeing out his contract when Real Madrid and Manchester United would move heaven and earth to sign him?
And if PSG are undone in the Champions League early in the knockout phase in 2018 then it could be a long second half of the season with Neymar dashing off on trips to Brazil or London as PSG win the league at a canter.
There may be mischief-making behind the steady stream of tales of discontent. Suarez might be right that Neymar regrets nothing.
But this is the player who walked away from the chance to play alongside Lionel Messi every week.
Neymar’s suitors know that he is capable of falling out of love with Paris just as quickly as he became besotted, to the tune of £198m, last summer.