Paris Saint-Germain’s Dani Alves has urged teammate Neymar to display more self-control after his altercation with a fan following last weekend’s Coupe de France final penalty loss to Rennes.
Alves and Neymar both featured as PSG lost again on Tuesday, this time 3-2 away to Montpellier in Ligue 1, and the former admitted that he was unable to defend Neymar’s recent behaviour.
“It was a delicate moment,” he said. “We had just lost a title and he was hot-headed. It was a reaction and one that I think was not right in that moment. You cannot get involved in this sort of thing. You have to show more control.
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“I believe that you have to make mistakes to improve. Not necessarily like this, but this mistake will cause him to reflect a bit. Neymar is an exceptional guy, but he can be a bit rash at times.
“This sort of reaction, no matter how friendly we are, I cannot be in favour of it. I believe that he has learned, and I hope that it will not happen again.”
PSG led twice in Montpellier but were pegged back and ultimately lost to a late Souleymane Camara goal.
Neymar played the full 90 minutes but was unable to prevent his team from going down to their third Ligue 1 defeat in their last four matches.
Marquinhos, who captained the side in Thiago Silva‘s absence, believes that Neymar knows he made a mistake at Stade de France last Saturday.
“I think that Neymar knows that he made a mistake,” he said. “When you attack somebody, it is a mistake. He is not a boy anymore — he knows when he is in the wrong.
“It will serve as a lesson for him. We already know that things with Neymar are amplified — he is used to that. Mistakes happen and are there to be learned from.”
PSG have four Ligue 1 matches left before the end of what will be their least successful season since the 2011-12 campaign — the maiden term under Qatari ownership.