Raphinha has scored in each of Barcelona’s first three La Liga matches this season, becoming the club’s first player to achieve that feat since Cesc Fabregas in 2011.
The Brazil forward found the net against Athletic Club, Elche and Rayo Vallecano, making an immediate impact in all three of Barcelona’s opening league fixtures.
His run means Raphinha is the first Barcelona player in 14 years to score in every one of the team’s first three La Liga games of a campaign. The previous player to reach that mark was Fabregas, who accomplished it in 2011 during his only season with the Catalan club.
Although Lionel Messi was Barcelona’s leading figure during that period, it was Fabregas who produced the scoring sequence that Raphinha has now matched. The achievement gives Raphinha a place in a particularly limited list of Barcelona players to have made such a start to a league season.
Only two other Barcelona players managed the same feat during the 21st century before Raphinha. Zlatan Ibrahimovic did so in 2009, also during his only season at the club, while Cameroon international Samuel Eto'o scored in each of Barcelona’s first three La Liga matches in 2006.
Raphinha’s goals against three different opponents have therefore placed him alongside Fabregas, Ibrahimovic and Eto'o in the club’s recent history. His record has come at the beginning of the current Spanish league campaign, with his goals arriving in successive opening fixtures rather than across a longer run of matches.
The sequence also sets his start apart from that of Barcelona’s other prominent forwards in the 21st century. Messi did not score in all three opening La Liga matches in 2011, when Fabregas held the distinction, while Ibrahimovic’s achievement came in his sole campaign in Barcelona colours. Fabregas likewise achieved the landmark in the only season he spent at the club.
For Raphinha, the run represents an outstanding opening to the season and a rare statistical accomplishment in Barcelona’s La Liga history. By scoring against Athletic Club, Elche and Rayo Vallecano, he has become the latest player to join a group that includes three notable former Barcelona forwards and Fabregas.
The Brazilian’s three-match scoring run is the first by a Barcelona player since 2011 and restores a landmark that had not been reached by the club’s players in the intervening years.