Worldscene: In the early hours of last Friday morning, Marina Lima de Souza went knocking on the front doors of houses in the Perus suburb of the Brazilian city Sao Paulo, looking for help. Marina, the 43-year-old mother of Brazilian footballing wunderkind Robinho, had just been released after 40 days of captivity.

Within hours, and after a brief hospital check-up, she was re-united with her all too obviously delighted son: "There's nothing better than seeing your mother happy and laughing. I can have a happy Christmas with my family now," commented the 20-year-old Santos player.

Six weeks ago, Marina de Souza had been enjoying a Saturday night barbecue at a friend's house in the town of Praia Grande, 75 kilometres from Sao Paulo, when gunmen jumped over the garden wall. At gunpoint, the intruders locked the other party guests into a bathroom before making off with Marina in her Mercedes car, later found abandoned.

Within days of the kidnapping, her famous footballer son had appealed for "privacy", and the case subsequently disappeared off the news list.

Last weekend, Brazilian media were carrying unconfirmed reports that a ransom had been paid for Marina's release. Apparently, early last Friday morning her kidnappers simply told her to walk out of the house in which she was being held captive.

As we pointed out when reporting on this kidnapping six weeks ago, the relatives of high-profile footballers (not to mention wealthy businessmen) have long since become a regular target for South American kidnappers. In that context, it was hardly surprising that, within hours of his mother's release, speculation about Robinho moving to European football had been revived.

Over the last 12 months, Robinho's name had been linked with various European clubs, including Chelsea, PSV Eindhoven, Benfica, Atletico Madrid and Real Madrid. While his mother was held captive, however, Robinho not only stopped playing for Santos but also put all transfer negotiations on hold.

Now that his mother has been released and the player has made a winning return to football, helping Santos lift their second league title in two seasons with a 2-1 victory over Vasco Da Gama on Sunday, the transfer windmill is beginning to whirl again.

Even before Marina's release, Robinho's agent, Wagner Ribeiro, had spelt it out loud and clear last week when he said: "We can see that Robinho is not going to be comfortable staying in Brazil. Frankly, I'm jealous of the Spanish who live so peacefully. In Brazil, I'm afraid of everything."

So then, sooner rather than later, Robinho will be bound for European football. It only remains to fix the price (his current "price tag" is a reported 20 million) and settle on the club.

Given that the two leading contenders are Chelsea and Real Madrid, then Robinho looks destined to be both one of the most expensive and most hyped signings of 2005.

It also remains to be seen if Robinho can live up to the lofty expectations generated by his media nickname, "The New Pele", a title that Pele himself unwittingly bestowed on him five years ago. After watching the 15-year-old Robinho play for a Santos junior team, Pele commented that he was reminded of himself at the same age.

In what was a very different era, Pele spent 17 years of his great career at Santos. Robinho, after just three seasons in the top flight with the club, seems certain to be moving on.

Robinho's contribution to Santos, though, has been immense, helping to put them back on the map of Brazilian football two years ago when winning their first title in 34 years. In that first breakthrough season, Robinho delighted fans and infuriated defenders with an exaggerated range of cheeky, dribbling skills.

So effective was Robinho that one opponent, Gremio goalkeeper Danriei, after a 3-0 drubbing by a Robinho-inspired Santos, issued a piece of not-so-friendly "advice": "Players get angry when they get dribbled past all the time. He could end up having his leg broken."

Robinho allegedly took no heed of that intimidating advice and continues to make the pedalada (stepover) his trademark trick. He may not be able to ignore the ugly socio-economic realities that give rise to a culture of kidnapping in South America, but he does have the footballing skills to ignore the boots of destructive defenders. Watch out for him, in the new year.