📍Rocafonda, Mataró, Barcelona, Spain
2007 – 2019“Lamine Yamal Nasraoui Ebana was born in July 2007 in Esplugues de Llobregat, near Barcelona, and grew up in Rocafonda, a working-class, multicultural neighbourhood of apartment blocks on the edge of Mataró, a coastal town north-east of Barcelona. His father, Mounir Nasraoui, is from Morocco, and his mother, Sheila Ebana, is from Equatorial Guinea. After his parents separated, he divided his time between Rocafonda, where his father and grandmother lived, and Granollers, where his mother lived. In 2007, when he was a baby, his family entered a raffle in Rocafonda for a charity calendar with UNICEF, and the photographer Joan Monfort took pictures of the young Lionel Messi bathing him in a tub at Camp Nou, a photograph that went viral years later. Lamine played football on the neighbourhood's concrete pitches from the time he could walk, and at four he joined the local club, CF La Torreta, where coaches noticed his calm understanding of the game. At seven he joined Barcelona's La Masia academy. He made his Barcelona first-team debut at fifteen, in 2023, and quickly became one of the most exciting young players in the world. At sixteen he won the European Championship with Spain in 2024, becoming the youngest scorer in the tournament's history, and in 2025 he won La Liga with Barcelona. He celebrates his goals by making the number 304 with his fingers, a tribute to the end of Rocafonda's postcode, 08304, and the number is painted on walls throughout the neighbourhood, where he remains a hero.”
🗺️ Approximate location today
📍 Street view today