Gabriel Barbosa

Gabriel Barbosa Almeida is a Brazilian football player born on 30 August 1996 in São Bernardo do Campo, in the state of São Paulo. The striker, known by the nickname Gabigol, won the Copa Libertadores twice with Flamengo, scoring a goal in both finals. He was part of the Brazilian squad that won the gold medal at the 2016 Rio Olympics.

Club career

He started playing football in the Santos infrastructure and played his first official league match against Flamengo on May 26, 2013, when he was only 16 years old. When he stood out with his scoring ability during his first season at Santos, he was transferred to Inter in the summer of 2016. He could not find the expected time in Italy; He spent the first half of the 2017–18 season on loan at Benfica, then returned to Santos on loan in 2018 and became the top scorer of the Brazilian league that year.

He experienced the brightest period of his career at Flamengo, where he went on loan in 2019. He won the cup for his team with two goals in the last minutes of the 2019 Copa Libertadores final against River Plate; In the same year, they also won the Brazilian league and he was chosen as South America's footballer of the year.

He moved to Flamengo with his transfer in 2020, and won his second league championship in the same season. His only goal in the 2022 Copa Libertadores final belonged to him.

He joined Cruzeiro on a four-year contract in January 2025. He is playing for Santos, the club where he trained on loan from Cruzeiro, in the 2026 season.

national team

He played his first match for the Brazilian national team on May 29, 2016, in the friendly match against Panama. He scored 5 goals in 18 matches between 2016-2022 and was in the squad that reached the final in the 2021 Copa América.