http://thelab.bleacherreport.com/greats-of-gremetal/

Just wanted to share this amazing article about Neymar's youth and the club that shaped him to be who he is today: Gremetal. I hope you read this eye-opening article because it is truly phenomenal.

Good read. I always wondered how players (especially highly-touted ones) reacted to not making it in professional soccer. Seems to be pretty different for everyone involved, but that one quote "things might have been different" is truly haunting to me.

I know it's mostly about Neymar, but for some reason that's what stuck out to me.

@Dynast Good read, thanks for the share, I find it sad most of his former team-mate couldn't achieve what he did and that his first club didn't get the recognition it deserved. Its really too bad. Wonder if Neymar donate a bit of his money to his former club, that would surely help them. :)

@Sunflash The concept of cutting off a possible path in front of us when making a decision, that all of one person live is changed by keeping faith or giving it up, it has alway be a fascinating thought for me but it is also quite a dangerous one, as it may lead to the path of regret which doesn't help much in my opinion.

The thing that disappoints me is that Neymar doesn't show gratitude to the club that raised him. Cristiano Ronaldo, Zidane, Messi, etc... all those great players showed terrific gratitude for the clubs that raised them. Zidane even spends thousands annually to maintain the club that raised him. Why can't Neymar? He's rich beyond imagination. Just a little gratitude for the people who pushed you to where you are now...

@Dynastian Agreed, I thought the same thing when I readed that. I was wondering if I was gonna be the only one to see thing this way to be sincere. I don't know everything, maybe he consider Santos as his true formative club since he played association football there and not futsal, maybe he doesn't realise how much he could help his old club or maybe he just doesn't care. Its impossible to tell, but I agree its really too bad a player as popular and rich doesn't use his ressource to help out his old club and pals. A true shame.

@Dynastian

As a fan of the NFL (where most players come from really low-income situations), it is not uncommon for players to feel a debt to those who helped make them the stars they became. This feeling occasionally leads to players who have made upwards of 40 million bucks in their careers go utterly bankrupt. Combining that feeling with no financial training whatsoever, and it's a recipe for disaster.

I understand that in Neymar's case, him running out of money is probably impossible, but nevertheless money changes people because they have to, or everyone else they used to know just begs for money 24/7. If Neymar feels that Santos had most of his development (certainly the rest of the world thinks so), and he feels as though his debt has been paid there after the Barca transfer fee, I can't blame him for that. While I think it's odd that he wouldn't help out his struggling younger team, I also am not certain that he is disappointment for not doing so. We don't know what Neymar himself thinks of the place, he might hate it, we don't know, and I find it irresponsible to make a judgement on him based on this article alone.

@Sunflash True as well. Its still sound a tiny bit bad at least. Then again, you see the guy in charge didn't seem to be mad at Neymar specifically.