Here’s an Inside Look at Neymar Jr. and Jordan Brand’s Collaboration

There's no doubt that Brazilian soccer star, Neymar Jr., is one of the most influential and widely recognized athletes of today's generation. The 24-year-old Barcelona striker has not only gained the respect and admiration of soccer fans, but has also been praised by the biggest names in sports for his incredible skills on the soccer field. One of the athletes whose praised Neymar for his excellent play on the field is none other than basketball legend Michael Jordan, who most recently partnered up with the Brazilian soccer star for a special footwear and apparel collection.

Consisting of a NJR and Jordan Hypervenom football cleat, an Air Jordan 5 Low Neymar iteration and set of matching apparel, the collection meshes two of the biggest names in sports to create a one-of-a-kind capsule collection. Marking the first time the Jordan Brand has launched a complete collection for an athlete who is not a member of the brand.

During a special private launch event to celebrate the collection, which included the presence of Neymar Jr., XXL chopped it up with the man behind the creation of Neymar's collection, Nike Football Sr. Design Director Nathan VanHook, to get more details behind this release and find out what's next for the Nike Football division.

XXL: With so many great soccer player these days, explain why Nike chose Neymar Jr. as the first soccer player to get his own Jordan Brand performance cleat and sneaker.

Nathan VanHook: I think the thing was when we were meeting with Neymar a lot in Barcelona, like a year and a half ago, we always noticed he wore Jordan hats and it'd be something organically that he would always be wearing. So we asked him, “Why Jordan?” and he would always speak on his greatness and his championships and that’s what every athlete strives for.

So it kind of sparked the idea of this amazing summer in soccer 2016 and why not do something special for Neymar and that kind of started the whole idea. We really looked at Neymar at the age of 24 and all of the stuff he’s accomplished, the championships and raising the game to another level in these competitions and Michael Jordan as well at that age and they both kind of came to the scene at a young age and redefined the game. The whole process has been super organic and it's been great to work on this special project.

From start to finish, how long would you say the process took to complete the collection?

Almost two years. It started in October or November of 2014 and then it’s all finally coming together now. In that process, we met with Neymar many times in Barcelona. We got the green light from MJ himself saying that he loves it and just the process has been super organic sitting with Neymar and talking about the different Jordans and showing him the archive of the different sneakers and him picking the Air Jordan 5, which is such an iconic sneaker, was great to see and witness the process.

During the creative process, what was something that you learned about Neymar?

I think I learned a lot about his love for the sport of soccer and how much he loves playing the game. Watching greatness admire greatness was cool to see being that Neymar respects MJ so much. The little things were great too! Watching him see the first sample of the shoe with the Neymar logo and the Jordan logo and watching him freak out. It was super excited to see. Those jaw-dropping moments in performance shoes is what we love to see at Nike.

Where do you see the Nike Soccer division going now that Neymar is on board?

Yeah, I think you’re going to see Nike Football being pushed a lot more and we’re super excited about this collection and seeing these two great athletes coming together.

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