Barcelona star’s injury woes linked to “Ballon d’Or stress”

It has been one month since Raphinha returned to action, and Barcelona are very grateful to have him back. In five starts since his comeback, the 29-year-old has four goals and one assist, and he struck in Sunday’s victory over 10-man Villarreal.

Prior to his return in November, Raphinha had missed the best part of two months with consecutive hamstring injuries. The first happened during Barcelona’s victory at Real Oviedo in September, which came in the same week as the 2025 Ballon d’Or ceremony.

As per Cadena SER, journalist Sique Rodríguez revealed that some Barcelona officials believe Raphinha’s first injury was caused by the stress of the Ballon d’Or ceremony in Paris, where the Brazilian finished fifth in the standings.

“At the club there are those who attribute one of this season’s injuries to several aspects. Among them the Ballon d’Or and the days after. Because he expected to be among the top three and he finished fifth. There are people within the club who attribute that injury to the stress of the whole week.”

Raphinha suffered relapse of injury in lead-up to El Clasico

That original injury was only supposed to sideline Raphinha for three weeks, but due to his recovery being rushed for October’s El Clasico showdown, he suffered a relapse, which led to him missing another month of action. He took responsibility for this, as well as the original injury in September.

This revelation on Raphinha’s hamstring injury in October comes after he was shockingly left out of FIFA The Best’s World XI last week. Despite being the joint-top scorer and top assist provider in last season’s Champions League, he was snubbed, which was met with a lot of fury from Barcelona head coach Hansi Flick during his pre-match press conference over the weekend.

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