Despite playing well in the league for Barcelona since his arrival from Leeds United this summer, Raphinha has struggled to get going in the Champions League.
It’s the competition he partly will have left Elland Road to play in, putting the Catalans’ historical status aside, but with La Liga side losing their last two games in the competition, their backs are now against the wall.
Left on the bench for the 5-1 win over Viktoria Plzen, the former Leeds star has since started against Bayern Munich and most recently Inter, without impacting either game in the manner he is expected to.
He was taken off in the 64th minute against the Italians, and was voted Il Peggiore (The Worst) by both Gazzetta dello Sport and Corriere dello Sport.
The two newspapers gave him a 5/10 rating for his performance, with the former asking the question ‘What is there to remember about his match?’
Gazzetta point out ‘he never bites, cuts in without purpose, doesn’t shoot and never finds the end product’ before adding that Xavi’s decision to take him off was ‘even late’, hinting he should have substituted him sooner.
As for Corriere dello Sport, they are briefer, but paint a rather vivid picture of there being ‘more smoke than fire’ when it comes to the Brazilian, who ‘struggled to get past Matteo Darmian’ throughout the evening, which is something many would have expected him to do with ease.
While it was always expected for Raphinha to take some time to adjust to life at Barcelona after spending the last two years at Leeds, his performances in La Liga suggested that might have already been the case.
However, Bayern Munich and Inter are a different kettle of fish to the likes of Real Valladolid and a underperforming Sevilla, and it seems the step up might have been a bit more of a shock than first anticipated.
