Brazil coach Mano Menezes has expressed his disappointment at the way in which Neymar was treated by the Seleção fans during their 1-0 friendly win over South Africa on Friday.
The 20-year-old, who was voted the best player playing in South America at the start of the year, was jeered by sections of the Brazilian supporters when he was replaced by Arouca late on in the second half at Säo Paulo"s Morumbi stadium.
Menezes has now moved to defend Neymar"s performance, stating that he thought the forward felt exhausted after a busy summer.
"We"re going to work through this calmly, [Neymar] is the best Brazilian player and we can"t have our best player treated like that," the former Corinthians boss told reporters.
"I thought he was very tired, probably because he played a lot of games recently. A player isn"t a machine. They need time to recover."
