Barcelona have scored so freely this season that individual milestones have started to slip past unnoticed, but the Lamine Yamal free-kick that made it 4-0 against Feyenoord on Wednesday night deserves its own asterisk. It was the 19-year-old’s first direct free-kick goal for the club — at the eighth attempt — and it arrived minutes after he had been handed the captain’s armband for the first time.
Hansi Flick’s side won 5-1 in their Champions League league-phase opener at the Spotify Camp Nou, with Raphinha scoring twice, Karim Adeyemi curling in his first goal at the stadium and Gabriel Jesus opening his Barcelona account late on after Steijn had briefly replied for the Dutch side. In front of 45,838 supporters on a wet Barcelona night, though, it was the No.10’s strike that carried the most history.
The Lamine Yamal free-kick that took three seasons to arrive
As Mundo Deportivo notes, Lamine Yamal had taken seven free kicks for Barcelona across the previous three seasons without a single one being credited to him. There was one that very nearly counted: a strike against Girona in 2024/25 that beat the goalkeeper but went into the official records as a Krejci own goal. Wednesday’s was, therefore, the first that the books will ever show under his name.
The circumstances made it better. Raphinha, Barcelona’s captain and the team’s regular set-piece taker, had gone off in the 71st minute; Pedri, the vice-captain, was already off. That left the armband with Lamine Yamal, who at 19 years and 59 days became the youngest captain in the club’s history, beating Bojan Krkic’s record of 20 years and 56 days set in a 2010 Copa del Rey tie — a landmark we covered in full here.
With around a quarter of an hour left, Feyenoord conceded a foul on Dani Olmo in a shooting position. Fermin Lopez picked up the ball and handed it straight to the teenager. The wall opened, the shot went through the gap, and goalkeeper Ernst was beaten. Lamine Yamal ran directly to the bench to celebrate with Raphinha — the man who had given him the armband, and who had told him earlier in the evening, when the forward looked a little flat, that he was going to score.
Fifty is a long way away
The obvious comparison is the uncomfortable one. Lionel Messi finished his Barcelona career with 50 direct free-kick goals, and it is worth remembering how long that took: Messi was not the designated taker for years, serving an apprenticeship behind Ronaldinho and then Xavi before the set-piece routine became his property. Lamine Yamal has one. The race, as Mundo Deportivo’s Xavier Bosch put it, has only just started.
There is no suggestion Barcelona are about to reassign the duty. Raphinha is scoring for fun — two more against Feyenoord, having already carried the goalscoring load since Robert Lewandowski’s departure — and he remains first in the queue at dead balls. But Flick now has evidence that when the Brazilian is off the pitch, the fallback is not a compromise.
A useful problem to have
That is the wider point of the Feyenoord night. Barcelona’s opening to the season has been built on volume rather than any one player: Adeyemi has settled quickly, Gabriel Jesus is off the mark, Rodri is dictating from deep, and Marc Bernal came on for his first minutes alongside the former Manchester City midfielder. Add a teenager who can now win a game from 20 yards with the ball stationary and the list of ways this side can hurt opponents keeps growing.
Barcelona return to La Liga action next, with the Blaugrana’s early form making them, in the words of former teammate Ronald Araujo — now on loan at Liverpool — genuine contenders for the competition they have just re-entered so emphatically.
