Brazil coach Ancelotti confident Neymar will recover in time for World Cup

1 hour ago 4

ARTICLE AD BOX

2 min readMay 31, 2026 10:59 AM IST

Neymar had broken the legendary Pele's record for most goals for Brazil during the 2022 World Cup. (AP Photo)

Neymar will recover from his calf injury in time for the FIFA World Cup next month, Brazil head coach Carlo Ancelotti has said. While Brazil’s record goalscorer did not feature in Ancelotti’s plans during the past year in which the Italian has been in charge of the national team, Neymar was selected in the final squad for the World Cup.

However, the veteran Santos forward was ruled out of warm-up games against against Panama and Egypt by the Brazilian Football Confederation (CBF) due to the calf injury on Thursday. “Before the squad announcement, we received a report from Santos saying the player had a minor issue, some swelling. We left Santos to deal with that situation until the 27th,” Ancelotti told reporters on Saturday ahead of Brazil’s meeting with Panama.

“Neymar was called up because, from the coaching ?staff’s point of ?view, he had to be called up. After the 27th, the CBF took over Neymar’s situation, and that’s what we’ve done. ?We’re managing Neymar’s recovery. We believe he’ll recover as quickly as possible.

“He’s working well, and he’s in good spirits … We believe he can be ready for the first World Cup match. If he’s not ready for the first match, he’ll be ready for the second. So we have absolutely no intention of replacing anyone.”

Neymar had broken the legendary Pele’s record for most goals for Brazil during their 2022 World Cup quarter-final match against Croatia in extra-time after the match finished 0-0 after 90 miniutes. However, Croatia equalised and pushed the match into penalties, which they won. Brazil were largely seen as favourites to win the title that year. While they are the most succesfull team in the history of the World Cup, having won it five times, BRazil have not won the covetted trophy since 2002. THey will face Morocco, Haiti and Scotland in Group C of the June 11 to July 19 tournament in North America.

Read Entire Article