Rayan Vitor Simplício Rocha (born 3 August 2006), known simply as Rayan, is a Brazilian

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

forward Forward is a relative direction, the opposite of backward. Forward may also refer to: People * Forward (surname) Sports * Forward (association football) * Forward (basketball), including: ** Point forward ** Power forward (basketball) ** Sm ...

for

Vasco da Gama Vasco da Gama, 1st Count of Vidigueira (; ; c. 1460s – 24 December 1524), was a Portuguese explorer and the first European to reach India by sea. His initial voyage to India by way of Cape of Good Hope (1497–1499) was the first to link E ...

Club career

Born in

Rio de Janeiro Rio de Janeiro ( , , ; literally 'River of January'), or simply Rio, is the capital of the state of the same name, Brazil's third-most populous state, and the second-most populous city in Brazil, after São Paulo. Listed by the GaWC as a b ...

, Rayan joined

at the age of six. He established a name for himself as a prolific goal-scorer, scoring 280 goals by the age of eleven. He continued this form into Vasco's under-17 team, scoring 29 goals in 34 games in 2022, catching the eye of Spanish side

Barcelona Barcelona ( , , ) is a city on the coast of northeastern Spain. It is the capital and largest city of the autonomous community of Catalonia, as well as the second most populous municipality of Spain. With a population of 1.6 million within ci ...

International career

Rayan was called up to the Brazil under-17 squad for friendlies against

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 ...

and

Paraguay Paraguay (; ), officially the Republic of Paraguay ( es, República del Paraguay, links=no; gn, Tavakuairetã Paraguái, links=si), is a landlocked country in South America. It is bordered by Argentina to the south and southwest, Brazil to th ...

in 2022; he scored twice in four games.

Personal life

His father, Valkmar, also played for Vasco de Gama, representing the club as a defender between 1995 and 2000.

Career statistics

Club

References

External links

{{DEFAULTSORT:Rayan 2006 births Living people Footballers from Rio de Janeiro (city) Brazilian men's footballers Brazil men's youth international footballers Men's association football forwards CR Vasco da Gama players