Liverpool,
\nBrazil will keep a close eye on the fitness of star striker Neymar when the World Cup contenders face Croatia in a friendly at Anfield on Sunday.<\/p>\n
Neymar, who scored four goals in the 2014 World Cup, has not played any form of football since February after breaking his foot.<\/p>\n
The 26-year-old Paris Saint Germain ace sat out training on Thursday as a precaution.<\/p>\n
But his Brazil team-mate Fernandinho has given a positive assessment of Neymar\u2019s condition just two weeks before the start of the World Cup on June 14.<\/p>\n
\u201cBy the movements and dribbles he has been doing in training, he has shown he is well,\u201d said the Manchester City midfielder.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe is confident which is important, he shows that he isn\u2019t scared of our defenders as he takes them on without fear.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis is the first steps to getting his confidence back to 100 per cent for the World Cup.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe also support his recovery because without a doubt he will be the difference for our team.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019ve been in his position when I was younger, being injured isn\u2019t easy even when getting back from injury doing daily workouts even when the bone is still hurting is still difficult.<\/p>\n
\u201cNeymar is ready. He is fit. He\u2019s not had a good injury and it takes time to recover. But he\u2019s training well, he\u2019s feeling well.\u201d Neymar could play some part as a substitute at Anfield, but Selecao boss Tite is unlikely to take any unnecessary risks, with their opening World Cup fixture against Switzerland looming on June 17.<\/p>\n
That said Neymar must surely have some game-time, with a friendly against Austria in Vienna on June 10 serving as Brazil\u2019s other warm-up fixture.<\/p>\n
Brazil, five-time world champions, have spent the week training at Tottenham ahead of their opening World Cup warm-up fixture.<\/p>\n
The match with Croatia gives the Liverpool crowd the opportunity to see former Reds star Philippe Coutinho.<\/p>\n
Brazil forward Coutinho left Liverpool for Barcelona in January, while his international colleague Roberto Firmino will also be hoping to feature on his home club ground.<\/p>\n
It is uncertain what kind of reception Coutinho will receive, with Liverpool legend Kenny Dalglish this week requesting the \u201cboo boys\u201d to stay away from the match.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe haven\u2019t had that conversation about Philippe returning to Anfield,\u201d Fernandinho said.<\/p>\n
\u201cBut I believe he\u2019s happy because he spent a couple years at Liverpool, had some fantastic games where his performances managed to take him to Barcelona and the Brazilian national team.<\/p>\n
\u201cI believe it will be an honour for him to return to a city and home he knows well.\u201d Brazil have an injury doubt over Renato Augusto and he is likely to miss Sunday\u2019s fixture due to a right knee issue.<\/p>\n
But Brazil\u2019s squad has had a relaxed feel to it this week ahead of the more serious work.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Liverpool, Brazil will keep a close eye on the fitness of star striker Neymar when the World Cup contenders face Croatia in a friendly at Anfield on Sunday. Neymar, who scored four goals in the 2014 World Cup, has not played any form of football since February after breaking his foot. The 26-year-old Paris Saint […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":32856,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[122],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-32855","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32855","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=32855"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32855\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":32857,"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32855\/revisions\/32857"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/32856"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=32855"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=32855"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=32855"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}