Raphinha's Fresh Start Under Hansi Flick at Barcelona

Raphinha draws a line under a brutal summer this week, trading World Cup frustration and injury rehab for a fresh start under Hansi Flick in England.

The Brazilian winger is due to report on 29 July for Barcelona’s pre-season camp on English soil, a week that runs until 3 August and includes friendlies against Birmingham City (31 July) and Preston North End (3 August). The club has even left the door open for him to appear at the training ground earlier and travel with the squad from day one.

For Flick, it feels like another key piece dropping into place. Anthony Gordon and Karim Adeyemi have already arrived to sharpen the attack for the 2026-2027 season. Raphinha is not a new face, but he is very much part of the plan. Under the German, he has been central to the five trophies Barcelona have lifted, a winger who marries work rate with end product and who quietly built a Ballon d'Or case in the 2024-2025 campaign.

That is why this summer cut so deep.

World Cup dream that never really started

Raphinha went to the 2026 World Cup as one of Brazil’s standout forwards, a leader in a side built to go deep into the tournament. Instead, his story in the competition barely got off the ground.

He limped out of the group-stage match against Haiti after feeling pain in the hamstring area of his right knee. Scans confirmed the muscle problem. He was not officially ruled out of the tournament, hope lingered, but the clock ticked faster than his body could respond.

By the time Brazil faced Norway in the last 16 on 5 July, Raphinha had received medical clearance. The stage seemed set for redemption. He never left the bench. Brazil crashed out 2-1, and one of their supposed attacking leaders watched the end of their World Cup from the sidelines, powerless.

For a player who had fought through a season of peaks and valleys at Barcelona to arrive at the tournament in top form, it was a brutal way to finish. The World Cup exit closed a campaign in which he had pushed through injuries in September and during the March international break, then re-emerged as a cornerstone of Flick’s project.

The cruel twist? It was the same hamstring again.

The recurring injury that won’t let go

The right knee hamstring issue has stalked Raphinha for months. He first suffered it with Brazil during the March international window, an injury that cost him five weeks at Barcelona and overlapped with the club’s elimination from both the Copa del Rey and the Champions League. Every time he seemed to hit full stride, that same area betrayed him.

The relapse before the World Cup opener, during Brazil’s meeting with France, wiped out the momentum he had built across Flick’s first season. The numbers told the story: personal bests in goals, assists and overall influence, the kind of campaign that pushed his name into the Ballon d'Or conversation. Then, just as the global stage beckoned, the muscle went again.

He has had to live with more than physical pain. In the aftermath of Brazil’s elimination, reports surfaced linking him to an €80 million offer from Al-Hilal. The proposal, according to those around him, never reached the player. Raphinha ignored the noise. At the same time, rumours about financial and family problems swirled around him, forcing those close to him to step in and deny them.

So he disappeared for a while. First to Orlando in the United States, then to Ibiza with his family. Away from the spotlight, away from the World Cup autopsy, he focused on healing.

Three weeks on from that night against Norway, he has recovered from the muscle injury, rebuilt his fitness and, crucially, put some distance between himself and the headlines that followed him through July.

Flick’s Barcelona still counts on him

Inside Barcelona, the message around Raphinha is simple: he stays, and he matters.

President Joan Laporta did not dress it up: “We have no intention of him leaving Barcelona.” For a club juggling finances, transfer speculation and the constant temptation of big-money offers from abroad, that is a clear stance. Raphinha is part of the core.

The technical staff see the same thing. In Flick’s first year, the Brazilian’s numbers exploded. His pressing, his work without the ball, his understanding of the system – all of it meshed with the coach’s demands. He became one of the faces of a side that collected five trophies and looked, at times, relentless.

Now the challenge is not tactical. It is physical.

Barcelona plan to devote serious resources to a personalised programme for him, a specific plan designed to strengthen that problematic area around the right knee and break the cycle of muscle injuries that has cost him so many matches. The club knows that a fully fit Raphinha changes the entire feel of their attack. He stretches games, he commits defenders, he delivers numbers.

He knows it too. Those close to him talk of a player who has “learned his lesson” from the repeated setbacks, someone determined to manage his body better and avoid the kind of overload that led to relapses.

A new start in England

That is why this pre-season camp in England carries more weight than a standard summer tour. It is not just about minutes and marketing. For Raphinha, it is a reset.

Birmingham City first, Preston North End after that. Modest opposition on paper, but ideal tests for a player coming off a stop-start summer. Short bursts, controlled workloads, the chance to feel the ball at his feet again in a Barcelona shirt rather than watching in a Brazil tracksuit.

Flick will look at his right flank and see options now: Gordon, Adeyemi, Raphinha. Different profiles, different threats. The German likes variety in his front line, and a fully firing Raphinha gives him just that – a winger who can hug the touchline or drive inside, who can create and finish.

From World Cup heartbreak to a training pitch in England, the turnaround has been swift. The question now is not whether Raphinha has the talent. He has already proved that under Flick. The real test is whether this summer marks the end of his injury saga – or just another chapter in a story his body refuses to let him finish.