Raphinha reveals Flick's phone call saved his Barcelona career and sparked a stunning revival

Raphinha had already resigned himself to leaving Barcelona in 2024 — until Hansi Flick picked up the phone. The Brazilian winger, now the club’s first-choice captain and centre-forward, told The Guardian that a single conversation with the German coach was the pivot point of his career, one that led to a contract extension to 2030 and a remarkable transformation into one of Europe’s most productive forwards.

By the time Flick called, Raphinha had good reason to feel unwanted. Despite contributing 10 goals and 12 assists in his debut season and 10 goals and 13 assists in his second, he completed 90 minutes just seven times in 60 appearances under Xavi Hernández. Barcelona had explored selling him while publicly pursuing Nico Williams as a replacement — failing twice — and a photoshopped image of Williams wearing Raphinha’s shirt circulating online only deepened the sense that his time at the club was over.

Flick reached Raphinha while he was in Brazil and asked him to meet before any final decision was made. According to Raphinha, the coach told him directly that he was trusted, that he would be important to the side, and that Barcelona’s style of play would suit him. That conversation, he says, restored the confidence he needed to play freely again.

A second moment reinforced the shift. When the Barcelona dressing room voted him in as club captain — third in line — Raphinha says it felt like a switch flipping in his mindset, proof that teammates believed in him in ways he had not yet believed in himself.

Flick has since made Raphinha his first-choice captain and, this season, his first-choice centre-forward. The positional change was born of necessity: Robert Lewandowski, Ferran Torres and Marcus Rashford all departed in the summer, having combined for 38 La Liga goals the previous season, and a move for Julián Álvarez collapsed. Barcelona were left without a natural striker.

Raphinha stepped in at centre-forward during pre-season against Basel and never relinquished the role. Seven games into the current La Liga campaign he had scored 12 goals, adding two more in the Champions League, as Barcelona won their opening eight league fixtures — scoring five, two, five, five, five, four, seven and three goals respectively. He scored in every match bar one, and against Levante he created the opening two goals before ceding a penalty to Lamine Yamal.

That form builds on an already exceptional run: 34 goals and 26 assists in 57 games during Barcelona’s 2024-25 title-winning campaign, followed by 21 goals and eight assists in 33 appearances last season despite injury disruption. Within two years of nearly being discarded, Raphinha has become indispensable.