Santos' Neymar named South American Player of the Year

There were no surprises in the voting, as the young Brazilian crushed the opposition to pick up El Pais' prestigious award by a record margin

By Daniel Edwards

Neymar - Santos
Neymar - Santos
Santos striker Neymar has been rewarded for an outstanding 2011, as he won El Pais' prestigious South American Player of the Year award by a record margin.

The 19-year-old forward beat Universidad de Chile star Eduardo Vargas by 60 votes in the 26th edition of the prize, taking 130 of the 247 ballots cast by journalists across the continent. The tally beats the previous record, set by Estudiantes legend Juan Sebastian Veron in 2009 with 109.

Santos team-mate Ganso took third place in the vote, while Uruguay and Tijuana midfielder Egidio Arevalo Rios was fourth.

Neymar was chosen thanks to a stunning year for both club and country. He lifted the Copa Libertadores and Paulista titles in Peixe colours, also making the final of the Club World Cup before losing heavily to Barcelona. He also starred in Brazil's successful South American Under-20 Championship, scoring nine times as the Selecao youngsters romped to first place in February.

Uruguay's Oscar Tabarez was also celebrating after winning the Coach of the Year prize for the second year in a row. Honoured for his 2011 Copa America triumph, Tabarez beat out Universidad de Chile coach Jorge Sampaoli, who won both domestic titles and the Copa Sudamericana at the helm of the Santiago team.


 
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19:46 BST
Joe Hart has also been giving his thoughts after the Belgium game: "It was a really tough game, a good run out. I thought we played well, [but] we were a little bit bitty at times.

"But, we came through. Obviously there were a lot of changes so it's good to get the result.

"Belgium are a very, very strong side who are going to be really good in the future. Vincent [Kompany] told me about them and said that they were coming good and I totally agree with him."
19:38 BST
Here's Roy Hodgson's reaction to the result and some injury chat: "I'm very pleased, it's been a hard week and we've used a lot of players. There was a lot of disruption in the second-half with substitutions – some forced upon us, some we wanted to do. But it's still a very good end to the week playing against a good Belgian team here. Arguably even stronger than the Norwegian team we played last week and I've got to be more than happy that we've come out with another victory."

"[Gary] Cahill I suppose is slightly more of a concern for me because it is a jaw injury. We're desperately hoping the CT scan doesn't show any fracture and it's just going to be a bruising situation, which will be bad enough, but won't stop him taking part in the tournament. As far as John's [Terry] concerned he felt his hamstring a little bit. Again it wasn't a major thing when he came off but we still need to scan it just to be 100 per cent sure."

Suffice to say, if Cahill has broken his jaw, he won't play any part in the tournament.
19:35 BST
And another point from today: Eden Hazard wasn't great. Don't think you can judge him on one performance though. What do you think? Is it just a case of too much hype around the Chelsea-bound Belgian?
19:32 BST
We're getting plenty of people saying it was boring. PLENTY. But Spain scored seven goals in eight games at the World Cup and I didn't hear too many of their fans complaining. Or as Fran Stinchcombe points out on Twitter: "If we had lost but played free flowing attacking football would these people still have moaned?"
19:24 BST
No, no, no. I'll have none of that Emile Heskey shouting anymore! Hello, it's me, it's me, it's that D-O-Y-L-E. Yes, I'm Joe Doyle, and I'll be here for all the reaction to that England game. First things first, how did everyone see that game? Good performance? A touch boring? Let me know on Twitter.
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