Rafaelle Leone Carvalho Souza (born 18 June 1991) is a Brazilian professional

footballer A football player or footballer is a sportsperson who plays one of the different types of football. The main types of football are association football, American football, Canadian football, Australian rules football, Gaelic football, rugby le ...

who plays as a defender or

midfielder A midfielder is an outfield position in association football. Midfielders may play an exclusively defensive role, breaking up attacks, and are in that case known as defensive midfielders. As central midfielders often go across boundarie ...

for

Arsenal An arsenal is a place where arms and ammunition are made, maintained and repaired, stored, or issued, in any combination, whether privately or publicly owned. Arsenal and armoury (British English) or armory (American English) are mostly ...

in the

FA Women's Super League The Women's Super League (WSL), currently known as the Barclays Women's Super League (BWSL) for sponsorship reasons, is the highest league of women's football in England. Established in 2010, it is run by the Football Association and features t ...

and the Brazil national team. Rafaelle played for the

University of Mississippi The University of Mississippi (byname Ole Miss) is a public research university that is located adjacent to Oxford, Mississippi, and has a medical center in Jackson. It is Mississippi's oldest public university and its largest by enrollment. ...

during her

college soccer College soccer is played by teams composed of soccer players who are enrolled in colleges and universities. It is very prominent in United States, Japan, South Korea, Canada, and as well as in South Africa and the Philippines. The United Kingd ...

career in the United States and spent the 2014 season playing for

Houston Dash The Houston Dash is a professional women's soccer team based in Houston, Texas. It joined the National Women's Soccer League (NWSL) in the 2014 season, and is affiliated with the MLS team Houston Dynamo FC. History Establishment On November ...

of the

National Women's Soccer League The National Women's Soccer League (NWSL) is a professional women's soccer league at the top of the United States league system. It is owned by the teams and, until 2020, was under a management contract with the United States Soccer Federatio ...

(NWSL).

Club career

In January 2014, Rafaelle was picked in the second round of the

2014 NWSL College Draft The 2014 NWSL College Draft was the second annual meeting of National Women's Soccer League (NWSL) franchises to select eligible college players. It was held on January 17, 2014, at the NSCAA Convention in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, and was ope ...

expansion team An expansion team is a new team in a sports league, usually from a city that has not hosted a team in that league before, formed with the intention of satisfying the demand for a local team from a population in a new area. Sporting leagues also ...

. After playing one season, she was waived by Houston Dash, but

FC Kansas City FC Kansas City was an American professional women's soccer club based in Kansas City, Missouri. The team was one of the eight founding clubs of the National Women's Soccer League in 2012, and began play in 2013. They were two-time NWSL champions ...

acquired her rights the following week. In March 2015 Kansas City announced that Rafaelle would not play in the

2015 National Women's Soccer League season The 2015 National Women's Soccer League season was the third season of the National Women's Soccer League, the top division of women's soccer in the United States. Including the NWSL's two professional predecessors, Women's Professional Soccer (2 ...

as she was in training with her national team Brazil. Rafaelle signed with

Changchun Zhuoyue Changchun Jiuyin Loans () is a Chinese professional football club located in Changchun. They compete in the Chinese Women's Super League, and their home stadium is the Development Area Stadium. Players Darlene de Souza joined fellow Brazil wom ...

of the

Chinese Women's Super League The Chinese Women's Super League (CWSL) is the top level women's football league in China. It was called the Chinese Women's National Football League from 2011 to 2014. History The league started in 1997 as the Chinese Women's Premier Football L ...

in 2016, one of three Brazilian players to do so with

Raquel Raquel or Racquel is a variation of the given name Rachel. Notable people with the name include: Raquel *Raquel (wrestler), Brazilian professional wrestler *Raquel Alessi (born 1983), American former actress and model * Raquel Naa Ayorkor Ammah ( ...

and Darlene. Terms of the deals were not released, but in an interview with

Globo Esporte TV Globo (, "Globe TV", or simply Globo), formerly known as Rede Globo, is a Brazilian free-to-air television network, launched by media proprietor Roberto Marinho on 26 April 1965. It is owned by media conglomerate Grupo Globo. The TV station ...

, Rafaelle said the pay was considerably more than she could make in Brazil. In 2017, fellow Brazilian national team player Cristiane would join her at Changchun Zhuoyue. In 2022, Rafaelle joined Arsenal on a free transfer from Changchun Zhuoyue. She is the first Brazilian to play for

Arsenal Women Arsenal Women Football Club, commonly referred to as Arsenal, is an English professional women's association football, women's football club based in London Borough of Islington, Islington, London, England. The club plays in the FA Women's Su ...

International career

Rafaelle played for Brazil's youth teams at the inaugural

2008 FIFA U-17 Women's World Cup The 2008 FIFA U-17 Women's World Cup is the first women's football U-17 World Cup in FIFA history. It was held in New Zealand from 28 October to 16 November 2008. It is the officially recognized world championship for women's under-17 national ...

in New Zealand and the

2010 FIFA U-20 Women's World Cup The 2010 FIFA U-20 Women's World Cup was the 5th edition of the tournament. It was held in Germany, who will also host the 2011 FIFA Women's World Cup a year later from 13 July to 1 August 2010. Sixteen teams, comprising representatives from all ...

held in Germany. Her senior debut came in December 2011 as a substitute in a 4–0 win over

Chile Chile, officially the Republic of Chile, is a country in the western part of South America. It is the southernmost country in the world, and the closest to Antarctica, occupying a long and narrow strip of land between the Andes to the east a ...

at the

2011 Torneio Internacional Cidade de São Paulo de Futebol Feminino Eleven or 11 may refer to: *11 (number), the natural number following 10 and preceding 12 * one of the years 11 BC, AD 11, 1911, 2011, or any year ending in 11 Literature * ''Eleven'' (novel), a 2006 novel by British author David Llewellyn *''El ...

. She started her first match for Brazil's senior team in March 2012, against

Canada Canada is a country in North America. Its ten provinces and three territories extend from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean and northward into the Arctic Ocean, covering over , making it the world's second-largest country by tot ...

. In February 2015, Rafaelle was included in an 18-month residency programme intended to prepare Brazil's national team for the

2015 FIFA Women's World Cup The 2015 FIFA Women's World Cup was the seventh FIFA Women's World Cup, the quadrennial international soccer championship contested by the women's national teams of the member associations of FIFA. The tournament was hosted by Canada for the ...

in Canada and the

2016 Rio Olympics ) , nations = 207 (including IOA and EOR teams) , athletes = 11,238 , events = 306 in 28 sports (41 disciplines) , opening = 5 August 2016 , closing = 21 August 2016 , opened_by = Vice President Michel Temer , cauldron = Vanderlei Cordeiro de ...

. At the 2015 FIFA Women's World Cup, Rafaelle formed a makeshift center-back partnership with Mônica. They kept

clean sheet In team sports, a shutout ( US) or clean sheet ( UK) is a game in which one team prevents the other from scoring any points. While possible in most major sports, they are highly improbable in some sports, such as basketball. Shutouts are usuall ...

s in all three matches as Brazil qualified from their group without conceding a goal. In the second-round match against

Australia Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a Sovereign state, sovereign country comprising the mainland of the Australia (continent), Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous List of islands of Australia, sma ...

, Brazil exited the competition after losing 1–0. Rafaelle remained in Canada as part of the Brazilian selection for the

2015 Pan American Games Fifteen or 15 may refer to: *15 (number), the natural number following 14 and preceding 16 *one of the years 15 BC, AD 15, 1915, 2015 Music *Fifteen (band), a punk rock band Albums * ''15'' (Buckcherry album), 2005 * ''15'' (Ani Lorak alb ...

Toronto Toronto ( ; or ) is the capital city of the Canadian province of Ontario. With a recorded population of 2,794,356 in 2021, it is the most populous city in Canada and the fourth most populous city in North America. The city is the ancho ...

. Rafaelle captained the Brazilian team to their 4th consecutive win in the 2022 Copa America Feminina.

International goals

Honours

Palmeries * Copa Paulista Women: 2021 Arsenal *

FA Women's League Cup The FA Women's League Cup is a league cup competition in English women's association football. The competition was originally open to the eight teams in the FA WSL, but since the WSL's restructuring to two divisions, it has featured 23 teams. Pri ...

2022–23 The dash is a punctuation mark consisting of a long horizontal line. It is similar in appearance to the hyphen but is longer and sometimes higher from the baseline. The most common versions are the endash , generally longer than the hyphen b ...

Brazil *

Copa América Femenina The Copa América Femenina (''Copa América Feminina'' in Portuguese; previously the ''Campeonato Sudamericano de Fútbol Femenino'' (''Campeonato Sul-Americano de Futebol Feminino''), usually shortened to ''Sudamericano Femenino'' (''Sul-Americano ...

2018 File:2018 Events Collage.png, From top left, clockwise: The 2018 Winter Olympics opening ceremony in PyeongChang, South Korea; Protests erupt following the Assassination of Jamal Khashoggi; March for Our Lives protests take place across the United ...

2022 File:2022 collage V1.png, Clockwise, from top left: Road junction at Yamato-Saidaiji Station several hours after the assassination of Shinzo Abe; 2022 Sri Lankan protests, Anti-government protest in Sri Lanka in front of the Presidential Secretari ...

Pan American Games The Pan American Games (also known colloquially as the Pan Am Games) is a continental multi-sport event in the Americas featuring summer sports, in which thousands of athletes participate in a variety of competitions. The competition is held ...

2015 File:2015 Events Collage new.png, From top left, clockwise: Civil service in remembrance of November 2015 Paris attacks; Germanwings Flight 9525 was purposely crashed into the French Alps; the rubble of residences in Kathmandu following the Apri ...

SheBelieves Cup The SheBelieves Cup is an invitational women's soccer tournament held in different cities in the United States in late February or early March. In its first three years (2016, 2017 and 2018), it was contested by the same four teams: the United ...

runner-up:

2021 File:2021 collage V2.png, From top left, clockwise: the James Webb Space Telescope was launched in 2021; Protesters in Yangon, Myanmar following the 2021 Myanmar coup d'état, coup d'état; A civil demonstration against the October–November 2021 ...

References

External links

* *
Profile
at soccerdonna.de

–

profile {{DEFAULTSORT:Souza, Rafaelle 1991 births Living people Brazilian women's footballers National Women's Soccer League players Houston Dash players Brazilian expatriates in the United States Expatriate women's soccer players in the United States Brazil women's international footballers Brazilian expatriate women's footballers 2015 FIFA Women's World Cup players Footballers at the 2016 Summer Olympics Women's association football midfielders Footballers at the 2015 Pan American Games Ole Miss Rebels women's soccer players Brazilian expatriate sportspeople in the United States Olympic footballers of Brazil Houston Dash draft picks Chinese Women's Super League players Changchun Zhuoyue players Brazilian expatriate sportspeople in China Expatriate women's footballers in China Pan American Games medalists in football Pan American Games gold medalists for Brazil Medalists at the 2015 Pan American Games Footballers at the 2020 Summer Olympics