09:22
OptimusJ
Tokyo (AFP) - Brazilian superstar Neymar's
brain activity while dancing past opponents is less than 10 percent the
level of amateur players, suggesting he plays as if on auto-pilot,
according to Japanese neurologists.
Results of
brain scans conducted on Neymar in February this year indicated minimal
cerebral function when he rotated his ankle and point to the Barcelona
striker's wizardry being uncannily natural.
"From MRI images we
discovered Neymar's brain activity to be less than 10 percent of an
amateur player," researcher Eiichi Naito told AFP on Friday.
"It is possible genetics is a factor, aided by the type of training he does."
The
findings were published in the Swiss journal Frontiers in Human
Neuroscience following a series of motor skills tests carried out on the
22-year-old Neymar and several other athletes in Barcelona in February
this year.
Three Spanish
second-division footballers and two top-level swimmers were also
subjected to the same tests, added Naito of Japan's National Institute
of Information and Communications Technology.
Naito concluded in his
paper that the test results "provide valuable evidence that the football
brain of Neymar recruits very limited neural resources in the
motor-cortical foot regions during foot movements".
Asked whether Neymar's Barcelona team-mate Lionel Messi or Real Madrid's Cristiano Ronaldo
might display similar test results, Naito said: "It is fair to assume
they would show similar levels given their footwork and technique."
Naito
told Japan's Mainichi Shimbun newspaper: "Reduced brain activity means
less burden which allows (the player) to perform many complex movements
at once. We believe this gives him the ability to execute his various
shimmies."
Neymar carried the
hopes of host nation Brazil on his shoulders at the recently ended
World Cup but his involvement ended in tears as he fractured a vertebra
in the 2-1 quarter-final victory over Colombia.
Without
their talisman, who had scored four goals in the tournament, Brazil
suffered their most humiliating defeat ever when they were pulverised
7-1 by eventual champions Germany in the semi-final.
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