Explained: Neymar and the sexual assault allegations surrounding his departure from Nike

When Neymar signed a £23 million deal with Puma last September, the German company announced it with the slogan “the King is back”, a reference to its most famous football boot, a model worn by Johan Cruyff, Diego Maradona and Pele in the past. Then 28, the Brazilian forward was truly walking in the footsteps of the game’s giants.

But £23 million seemed an awful lot for someone the industry was starting to talk about. And not in a good way.

Some suggested Nike, the company Neymar had been associated with for 15 years, was letting him go with two years still to run on his contract because he was high maintenance, he wanted too much money, his brand had been damaged by too many tantrums and tumbles, particularly at the 2018 World Cup finals, and others had overtaken him in the game’s line of succession behind Lionel Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo.

Others pointed out Nike didn’t need its swoosh logo on his feet anymore; after all, as both teams’ kit sponsor, he had it on his chest whenever he played for Paris Saint-Germain or Brazil.

But it takes more than whispers to stop a juggernaut and, once this season had properly started and the dust settled, nobody apart from a few brand managers were talking about why Nike would let one of its most high-profile athletes leave for a rival at what should be the peak of his powers.

Until Friday’s edition of the Wall Street Journal appeared online, that is.

In a shocking report, the newspaper revealed that Nike cut ties with Neymar because he refused to co-operate with an investigation into a claim he sexually assaulted a female employee after a marketing event in 2016.

It is a story that instantly prompts comparisons with similar allegations made against Cristiano Ronaldo in 2018 and the ongoing legal process that surrounds the Houston Texans quarterback Deshaun Watson.

What exactly are the claims against Neymar?

Between winning a domestic double with Barcelona in 2015-16 and leading Brazil to Olympic gold in Rio later that summer, Neymar visited New York City for a publicity campaign with basketball legend and fellow Nike icon Michael Jordan. The pair were collaborating on a new shoe range.

The alleged victim is a marketing executive who still works for Nike. She and her colleagues were working with Neymar on logistics for the product launch.

In the early hours of June 2, she and a colleague were asked by hotel staff to help Neymar into his room. The player seemed to be intoxicated after an evening in a nightclub.

The woman says she was briefly left alone in the room with Neymar and in that time he took off his underwear and tried to force her to perform oral sex. When she attempted to leave the room, he blocked her exit and then chased her, half-naked, down the corridor.

Citing “people familiar with the matter” and documents, The Wall Street Journal reports she told family, friends and colleagues about the alleged incident that night and over the following days and weeks.

She did not make a complaint, though, until 2018, when other women at Nike were coming forward to share negative experiences as part of a survey about the treatment of women at the company. During this process, she told Nike’s human resources boss and general counsel.

By this point, Neymar had moved from Barcelona to Paris Saint-Germain for a world-record fee of €222 million but continued to front Nike advertising campaigns, including one that coincided with the 2019 Women’s World Cup and focused on female athletes.

It was at that time, however, that a Brazilian model accused him of raping her in a hotel in Paris in May 2019. He said the sex was consensual and accused her of trying to blackmail him.

The Brazilian authorities investigated the rape allegation but dropped the matter, citing a lack of evidence. They subsequently charged the woman with extortion, slander and procedural fraud but the first two charges were dropped before the end of the year and she was acquitted of fraud in 2020. She maintains her original story.

Having read about that case, the Nike employee asked the executives she had confided in a year earlier about the status of her own complaint. They told her that no action had been taken as they thought she had not wanted them to proceed.

Having established that was not the case, Nike called in an external law firm to start interviewing witnesses. The company also helped her find legal representation and agreed to pay the bill.

Neymar, however, refused to co-operate with this investigation and was removed from Nike’s various advertising campaigns.

What does Nike say about this?

In a statement, the US-based firm says it was “deeply disturbed” by the allegations, adding it has always treated the employee’s claims “with great seriousness”.

Confirming the newspaper’s timeline, Nike says when the woman first came forward in 2018, “she did so only with assurances of confidentiality”. Nike claims it was “prepared and ready to investigate at that time” but respected her initial desire to keep the matter confidential. It says it had to “respect her privacy and did not believe it was appropriate to share that information with law enforcement or any third party” without consent.

When that changed in 2019, Nike says it “acted immediately” but that “the investigation was inconclusive”.

“No single set of facts emerged that would enable us to speak substantively on the matter,” the statement continues. “It would be inappropriate for Nike to make an accusatory statement without being able to provide supporting facts. Nike ended its relationship with the athlete because he refused to co-operate in a good-faith investigation of credible allegations of wrongdoing by an employee.”

The company’s long and seemingly successful relationship with the player was abruptly ended last August, when a short Nike statement announced: “Neymar Jr will no longer be a Nike player as of August 31, 2020.”

Less than a fortnight later, the official Puma Twitter account confirmed the player would be returning to billboards with the tweet: “Welcome to the fam @neymarjr #KingIsBack.”

What has Neymar said?

Earlier on Friday, his spokeswoman told The Athletic his camp have nothing to add to the statement she gave to the newspaper.

Her statement says these claims are similar to the ones made by the Brazilian model in 2019, which she says Neymar was cleared of, and are false.

“Neymar Jr will vigorously defend himself against these baseless attacks in case any claim is presented, which did not happen so far,” she says, adding that Neymar and Nike split for commercial reasons.

“It is very strange a case that was supposed to have happened in 2016, with allegations by a Nike employee, came to light only at that moment.”

But later on Friday, a new statement appeared on Neymar’s Instagram feed.

“Facts can be twisted because people see them from different angles,” it says. “There’s no denying that life is like this. Be a part of it!

“I even understand when someone criticises my conduct, the way I play, the way I live my life. We are different!

“(But) I don’t really understand how a serious business can distort a business relationship that is backed up on documents. Written words cannot be altered. They sure are very clear. Leave no doubt!

“Ever since I was 13, when I signed my first contract, I was always warned: don’t talk about your contracts! Contracts are classified! To go against this rule and claim that my contract was terminated because I did not contribute in good faith to an investigation is absurd, liar.

“Once again I am warned that I cannot comment in public. Outraged, I will obey!”

The statement, however, goes on to suggest Nike continued to work with him, even bringing him back to the US to work “with the same people”, in 2017, 2018 and 2019, despite apparently being aware of an allegation from 2016.

“A matter so serious and they did nothing,” he continues, adding he was not “given a chance to defend myself” or told who his accuser is.

The statement finishes with a reference to the fact he wears Nike kit for club and country.

“Irony of fate, I will continue to stamp on my chest a mark that has betrayed me. Such is life! I will remain firm and strong believing that time, always cruel time, will bring the real answers.”

This Instagram post followed an earlier one from the player’s agent, Wagner Ribeiro, that is even more inflammatory.

“Nike didn’t want Neymar anymore,” writes Ribeiro. “Nike couldn’t afford to break the contract. Nike asks a girl to invent Neymar’s sexual harassment. After five years, Nike completes the strategy and tells the story.”

Neymar’s father has actually spoken to reporters in Brazil, telling them Nike is “blackmailing” his son. He also incorrectly claimed that other athletes, citing Ronaldo and late US basketball star Kobe Bryant, quit the company facing allegations of a similar nature. In both of those cases, Nike stood by its athletes, as it has with golfer Tiger Woods, despite his well-publicised personal problems.

What have PSG said?

Bankrolled by Qatar’s sovereign wealth fund, the Parisians stunned global football when they met the exit clause in Neymar’s contract at Barcelona. An asking price that was twice what anyone had paid for a footballer before, the Catalans assumed it would scare predators away.

Neymar’s time in the French capital, however, has not quite delivered the success his chief sponsors wanted. There have been lots of goals and domestic silverware — this season is the first since he arrived that PSG have not finished as French champions — but the closest they have come to winning the Champions League, the prize they crave, was last season’s 1-0 defeat in the final by Bayern Munich.

There have also been several injuries, rows and sulks, with frequent stories about him pining for a return to Barcelona or even fancying a run-out for their arch-rivals, Real Madrid.

So there were some eyebrows raised when it was announced earlier this month that Neymar and PSG had signed up to another four years of each other’s company.

It has been suggested the club did not extend his contract with any particular enthusiasm, as they have grown tired of hosting the circus that has attached itself to Neymar, and that one reason they renewed was because they did not think they would get anywhere near what they paid for him in a transfer market depressed by COVID-19. The fact that Qatar’s other football investment, next year’s World Cup finals there, is on the horizon may also have played a part in the decision to keep him on board.

In Neymar’s defence, the player remains popular with his team-mates and there is a feeling he has been more reliable for the team in the past 18 months.

The club, however, are yet to say anything about the Wall Street Journal’s revelations and are understood to be carefully considering just what they can say, given the fact the allegations go back to a time when he was not their player, there does not appear to be any police complaint and Neymar’s personal contracts are his own affair.

However, The Athletic understands the news has hit PSG hard and they are planning to write to Barcelona to ask if Nike ever raised the issue with them. This would appear unlikely, as Nike has already explained that the employee did not raise it with the firm’s HR department until 2018, after his move to France, although it is also said that the woman did describe details of the incident to Nike colleagues earlier.

What is equally unlikely, though, is any huge show of public support for their player, as Juventus memorably did for Ronaldo in 2018 after Las Vegas police reopened an investigation into an alleged rape in 2009, long before he joined the Italian club. The Portuguese star and the alleged victim reached a private settlement in 2010 but details of the case were leaked to a German newspaper.

For a period, it looked like the scandal could topple football’s most sought-after sandwich board but Ronaldo and his many sponsors kept quiet, and when the police investigation was dropped, the world moved on.

Neymar, his club, his country and his many sponsors (he has 16, including Qatar Airways and Qatar National Bank, as well as a deal with Epic Games, the makers of Fortnite, that has only recently been signed) will be hoping he can follow Ronaldo’s trajectory more smoothly this time.

Puma, for what it is worth, has declined to comment.

(Photo: Aurelien Meunier – PSG/PSG via Getty Images)