His omission from the 30-man Ballon d’Or shortlist caused quite a stir, especially given his numbers, which have been extraordinary, particularly at the start of the season. Little wonder, then, that the Catalan papers have been calling him the “best striker in the world”. Perhaps that is going a little too far, but right now Raphinha is not far off deserving a description as grand as that. The latest game was another night to remember: the 7-2 win over Racing Santander was another in a start to the season in which Barcelona, and Raphinha with them, have given the impression of being almost omnipotent, of being able to do anything. The Brazilian left the Camp Nou with a hat-trick that took his tally to nine goals in the first six rounds of La Liga. Barcelona keep winning, they remain an attacking side capable of captivating the world, and at the centre of it all is the centre-forward nobody expected. Raphinha is La Liga’s top scorer, two goals clear of team-mate Lamine Yamal and Real Madrid’s Kylian Mbappé, both on seven. His tally after six games has only one Barcelona precedent this century: Leo Messi, who reached nine in the 2017-18 season.
The figure looks even more striking alongside his team-mate’s. Raphinha and Lamine Yamal have scored 16 of Barcelona’s 28 goals in their first six league games under Flick, more than half of the team’s entire attacking output. A pair with that kind of scoring record had not been seen in La Liga for 86 years. The last time it happened was at Sevilla in 1940-41, when Campanal and Torrontegui combined for 19 goals in their first six games. But that was another football. Or perhaps not, because Raphinha had already entered the history books before last night, having scored in each of the first four rounds of La Liga, a feat previously achieved by only five Barcelona players: Kubala, Cayetano Ré, César Rodríguez, Zlatan Ibrahimović and Cesc Fàbregas.
His numbers also show how much his performances have changed since Flick took over at Barcelona. Raphinha has scored 39 goals in 64 La Liga appearances under the German coach. With Xavi in charge, he had managed 13 – exactly one third – in the same number of games. Since Flick arrived, the former Leeds winger’s goalscoring has taken off. The official La Liga statistics tell the same story: alongside those nine goals, Raphinha has three assists and 15 shots in six games, all of them as a starter. He has had a direct hand in 12 of Barcelona’s 28 league goals. He has also become increasingly adept at getting Barcelona off the mark early, scoring inside the first 20 minutes in five of their first six games. In three of them, he scored the opener himself.
The Champions League has brought more of the same. Against Feyenoord, in Barcelona’s European opener, Raphinha scored twice, with Barcelona’s quickest goal of the season coming just three minutes after kick-off. Raphinha has become the centre-forward Barcelona spent the summer looking for, with Julián Álvarez the main target. In the end, they only had to look at home to find one even more lethal.