{"id":22102,"date":"2026-01-07T11:44:55","date_gmt":"2026-01-07T09:44:55","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/jhb-webdevelopers\/channelafrica\/news\/neymar-extends-santos-deal-through-2026-eyeing-world-cup-return\/"},"modified":"2026-02-27T16:33:10","modified_gmt":"2026-02-27T14:33:10","slug":"neymar-extends-santos-deal-through-2026-eyeing-world-cup-return","status":"publish","type":"news","link":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/news\/neymar-extends-santos-deal-through-2026-eyeing-world-cup-return\/","title":{"rendered":"Neymar extends Santos deal through 2026, eyeing World Cup return"},"content":{"rendered":"<div>Neymar has agreed to extend his contract with Santos until the end of 2026, the Brazilian club said on Tuesday, as he maintains hopes of a World Cup call-up despite recent injuries.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>The 33-year-old forward returned to his boyhood club Santos in January 2025 and played a key role in their survival in the Brazilian top flight, scoring five times in their last five matches.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>&#8220;Santos is my place, I&#8217;m at home,&#8221; Neymar said in a video published on the Brazilian club&#8217;s social media. &#8220;It&#8217;s with you that I want to achieve the dreams that are still missing,&#8221; he added, referring to Santos&#8217; fans.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>Neymar, who has long struggled with injuries, underwent successful arthroscopic surgery on his knee last month.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>The former Barcelona and Paris St Germain star, Brazil&#8217;s all-time top scorer with 79 goals, has not featured for the five-time World Cup winners since 2023. Manager Carlo Ancelotti said in October he must be fully fit to earn a recall.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>Brazil will face Scotland, Morocco and Haiti in Group C of the World Cup, running from June 11 to July 19 in Canada, Mexico and the United States.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>&#8211;Reuters&#8211;<\/div>\n","protected":false},"featured_media":21559,"template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false},"news-type":[20],"class_list":["post-22102","news","type-news","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","news-type-sport","entry"],"acf":{"short_description":"Neymar has long struggled with injuries.","published_date":null,"news_description":"Neymar has long struggled with injuries.","form_embed":"","author":"","image_caption":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/22102","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/news"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/22102\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":25515,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/22102\/revisions\/25515"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/21559"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=22102"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"news-type","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news-type?post=22102"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}