The Portuguese star striker doesn't leave anything to chance. In the Real Madrid team bus, he always sits in the back row. In a plane, it's the front row. He always steps onto the football field with his right foot first, and during half-time, without fail, he will adjust his hair. Could all this explain his having scooped up five Ballon D'Or soccer awards?

He's the best player in the world. At least that's what Neymar himself said, explaining that Lionel Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo are "from another planet." But the Brazilian striker still relies on certain rituals to up his game. Before each match, he prays with his father. When he steps onto the field with his right foot first, he also touches the grass with his hands and says another prayer.

At the 1990 World Cup, former Argentinian goalie Sergio Javier Goycochea made a habit of urinating on the field in preparation for defending penalty kicks. Well, that's one way to unsettle your opponents. The ritual seemed to do the trick right up until the final match, when Argentina lost 0:1 to Germany.

Germany's goalkeeper and team captain, Manuel Neuer, also indulges in rituals to get the edge over his opponents. In a routine that looks almost pious, Neuer touches both goal posts before each match and again before the second half. Will it do the trick at the World Cup 2018?

He was the hero of the World Cup 2014, continuing to play even with a bloody face. The former German national captain, who is now under contract with Chicago Fire in the United States, led the German team to World Cup victory. His own superstitious quirk is that he likes to play with wet socks and boots.

As captain, Laurent Blanc led the French national team onto the field for years. Before each international match, he would kiss the shaven head of teammate and goalie Fabien Barthez. It apparently brought Blanc luck. And the more matches the team won, the more other players began to copy the ritual. Eventually, the whole team was lining up to plant a pre-match kiss on the goalie's head.

Football boots should fit well. But former German player Gerd Müller insisted on wearing shoes that were three sizes too big. He said he was able to rotate better that way. Austrian Johann Ettmayer, on the other hand, wore shoes that were too small. He said football boots should be like "condoms for your feet."

He's now a sports pundit for the BBC, but back in the 1980s Lineker was considered England's best striker. Yet, when warming up for a game,he never aimed for the goal itself: He didn't want to "use up" his goals beforehand.

Doctors tend to warn against sauna visits or hot baths before a soccer game, because intense heat is bad for top athletes. Frenchman Eric Cantona, however, flouted such advice and got into a warm bath for five minutes at precisely 8 a.m. on every match day.

For years, the Spanish superstars have grabbed one trophy after another, the last one at the Champions League this year. But in 1912, things were different: the team had not won a match in five years. To put a stop to the dry spell, people planted a clove of garlic in the middle of the soccer field. That same season, the team won the Copa del Rey.

Romeo Anconetani was president of Italy's AC Pisa club from 1978 to 1994. He was convinced that salt helped his team win games, and would scatter it on the pitch before a match. The more important the game, the more salt he would sprinkle. Once, when his team was struggling to keep up with rivals AC Cesena, he got through 26 kilograms of the stuff.

The fixation of the Brazilian coach on the number 13 was legendary. He worshipped Saint Anthony, whose patron day is June 13. Zagallo also lived on the 13th floor of a highrise building, married on the 13th day of the month and, when he played soccer himself, always wanted to wear the number 13. In 1994, Zagallo led his Brazilian team to World Cup victory.

In 1986, coach Carlos Bilardo forbade his national team from eating poultry because he considered it bad luck. So, only steak was served up. In addition, he also demanded that his players exchange tubes of toothpaste before each match, because he himself had borrowed a tube from one of his players before the first successful game. And behold: the Argentinians became World Cup champions.

Legendary Italian coach Giovanni Trapattoni, who got FC Bayern up and on their feet in the 1990s and coined the phrase "weak like an empty bottle," is superstitious. Or rather, he's religious. Before he would let his team of 11 out onto the field, he would pour holy water onto it first. He had good connections for getting the holy fluid, too: His sister was a nun.

German national coach Jogi Löw also believes in lucky charms. For years, it was a blue cashmere sweater. Faith in the item was mimicked by many fans during the World Cup 2010. Clothing shops found they were selling out of the item. Löw has donated the original sweater to the DFB Soccer Museum, but he still swears by the color blue. Will it be a winning color in Russia?