“He hits me in the face” – Joan Garcia shows off battle scars from Barca debut

Barcelona made a strong start to their La Liga title defence as they defeated Mallorca 3-0 in a fiery encounter at Son Moix. Raphinha, Ferran Torres and Lamine Yamal got the goals for Hansi Flick’s side, as the hosts had Manu Morlanes and Vedat Muriqi sent off inside the opening 40 minutes.

Morlanes saw red for two yellow cards, while Muriqi was dismissed after landing a boot in the face of Barcelona goalkeeper Joan Garcia. Initially, a yellow card was shown to the Mallorca striker, before a VAR check saw it upgraded to red.

Garcia was making his Barcelona debut at Son Moix, having only been registered hours before kick-off. And he got a brutal memento from the occasion, as he has pictured with a nasty bumo during post-match interviews.

And during one of those interviews (via MD), Garcia recalled the incident that saw him end up with the bump on his right cheek.

“I haven’t seen it repeated, but it hits me in the face. I don’t know with what part of the body, but it hits me in the face. If the VAR has said that it was red, I suppose it will be like that. I will put on a little ice now.”

Mallorca’s two early dismissals meant that it was a rather quiet debut for Garcia, who only made one save on the way to a clean sheet. Barcelona were delighted to have signed the goalkeeper form city rivals Espanyol earlier this summer, and they will hope that the match saw the first of many shoutouts with him in-between the goalposts.

Garcia will now turn his attention to next weekend, with Barcelona facing Levante in their second match of the 2025-26 La Liga season. He will be hoping for another clean sheet on that occasion.