Grains of salt time, ladies and gentlemen, but word on the street says that Chelsea are lined up to acquire Neymar for £30M from Brazilian side Santos FC over the summer. This has apparently been confirmed by multiple inside sources (although none of them my own, since I don't have any), and well, here's the lowdown:
Word is Neymar deal indeed as good as done. Left 2 resolve: Neymar under contract with Nike -> wanted him 2 go 2 Barca & not 2 Adidas team.
The Nike thing is probably a non-issue, so I wouldn't worry over-much about that, and if that's all there is to worry about then the deal really is as good as done. We've heard a lot connecting Neymar to Chelsea specifically over the last few days, and there's no doubt that the Blues would be looking to add him to the side - although £30M would be an incredibly steep price for the 19 year-old, and would take Chelsea's total 2011 expenditure up over £100M.
However, the kid's being chased by basically everyone in Europe, and even if Santos are willing to send him to Chelsea and Neymar's willing to come to London, there's nothing to stop, say, Inter Milan (or more realistically Manchester City) hijacking any deal by offering more for him. And since Chelsea can't actually acquire him until the summer transfer window, there are months for this thing to fall apart even if the rumours are true. So don't go celebrating just yet.
Still, it's very difficult to paint this as bad news. Acquiring Neymar to go along with David Luiz and Ramires would essentially give Chelsea the core of Brazil's future squad, and I think the main lesson we can take away from this season is that Brazilians are good.