Rodrigo Barbosa Tabata (born 19 November 1980) or simply Rodrigo Tabata, is a 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 lea ...

who plays for

Al Rayyan Al Rayyan (; also spelled ''Ar Rayyan'') is the third-largest municipalities of Qatar, municipality in Qatar. Its primary settlement is the Al Rayyan (city), city of the same name, which occupies the entire eastern section and is a part of the Do ...

as an

attacking midfielder In the sport of association football, a midfielder takes an outfield position primarily in the middle of the pitch. Midfielders may play an exclusively defensive role, breaking up attacks, and are in that case known as defensive midfielders. ...

. Born in Brazil, he played for the Qatar national team.

Club career

Career in Brazil

Tabata was born in

Araçatuba Araçatuba is a city located in the northwest of São Paulo state, Brazil. The city has 198,129 inhabitants (IBGE/2020) and spans . The city name comes from the Tupi language and means "abundance of araçá" (a fruit, Psidium cattleianum). Araç ...

, Brazil, of Japanese descent. Earlier in his career, he was a

journeyman A journeyman is a worker, skilled in a given building trade or craft, who has successfully completed an official apprenticeship qualification. Journeymen are considered competent and authorized to work in that field as a fully qualified employee ...

and played for 11 different clubs between 1999 and 2003. In 2004, he moved to

Goiás Goiás () is a Brazilian States of Brazil, state located in the Central-West Region, Brazil, Central-West region. Goiás borders the Federal District (Brazil), Federal District and the states of (from north clockwise) Tocantins, Bahia, Minas Ge ...

, playing the

Campeonato Brasileiro Série A The Campeonato Brasileiro Série A (; English: "Brazilian Championship A Series"), commonly referred to as the Brasileirão (; English: "Big Brazilian" or "Great Brazilian"), the Série A or the Brazilian Série A (to distinguish it from the I ...

for the first time. His good performances helped his club finishing in 3rd place in the 2005 edition, the best position Goiás ever achieved in the top flight and qualifying for the

Copa Libertadores The CONMEBOL Libertadores, also known as Copa Libertadores de América (), is an annual continental club football competition organized by CONMEBOL since 1960. It is the highest level of competition in South American club football. The tournam ...

for the first time in its history. Tabata was purchased by Santos in 2006, where he won twice the

Campeonato Paulista The Campeonato Paulista Série A1, commonly known as Campeonato Paulista, nicknamed Paulistão, is the top-flight professional state football league in the Brazilian state of São Paulo. Run by the São Paulo State Football Federation (FPF), ...

in 2006 and 2007. In 2008, he moved abroad to

Gaziantepspor Gaziantepspor was a Turkish football club located in the city of Gaziantep. Formed in 1969 and dissolved in 2020, Gaziantepspor were nicknamed the ''Şahinler'' (The Falcons). The club colours were black and red, and they played their home matc ...

in a three-year loan deal with an option to a permanent purchase.

Gaziantepspor and Beşiktaş

After a successful season with Gaziantepspor, Tabata moved to

Beşiktaş Beşiktaş () is a district and municipality of Istanbul Province, Turkey. Its area is 18 km2 and its population is 175,190 (2022). It is located on the European shore of the Bosphorus strait. It is bordered on the north by Sarıyer and ...

for €8 million transfer fee. The transfer caused controversy at Santos as the Brazilian club claimed that they have not received the fee from Gaziantepspor to make the deal permanent before the deal was finished between the Turkish clubs. Tabata played one full season at Beşiktaş before moving on loan to

in 2010, later being purchased by the Qatari side in 2011.

Al Rayyan

In late 2011, the

administration asked Tabata, who has

Japan Japan is an island country in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean off the northeast coast of the Asia, Asian mainland, it is bordered on the west by the Sea of Japan and extends from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea ...

ese grandparents, to obtain a Japanese passport for reasons relating to the foreign player quota of the

AFC Champions League The AFC Champions League Elite (abbreviated as the ACL Elite) is an annual continental club association football, football competition organised by the Asian Football Confederation, and contested by Asia's List of top-division football clubs i ...

. However, Tabata failed the prerequisites as he was unable to write or read the Japanese language. He received a $100,000 cash award on 8 April 2012 for scoring a super hat-trick (4 goals) against

Qatar SC Qatar Sports Club () is a sports club based in Doha, Qatar. It is best known for its football team which competes in the Qatar Stars League. The club was founded in 1961 with the merger of two Qatari football clubs, Al-Oruba and Al-Nasour. They ...

in a league game to give his team an 8–2 win, which was the highest scoring game recorded in the league for the 2011–12 season. He also won the player of the year award in the Qatar Stars League that season, recording 17 goals and 9 assists.

Loan to Al Sadd

On 31 January 2014, he signed a loan deal with another Qatari club and title holders

Al Sadd Al Sadd Sports Club () is a Qatari sports club based in the Al Sadd district of the capital city Doha. It is best known for its association football team, which competes in the top level of Qatari football, the Qatar Stars League. Locally, it i ...

. He returned to Al Rayyan in 2015.

Al Sadd

In July 2020, Tabata signed with Al Sadd for one year. He then returned to Al Rayyan in 2023. According to

IFFHS The International Federation of Football History & Statistics (IFFHS) is an organisation that chronicles the history and records of association football. It was founded in 1984 by Alfredo Pöge in Leipzig. The IFFHS was based in Abu Dhabi for so ...

, Tabata was the fourth-oldest player in the world to play a match in the top tier of a national league in 2024, at the age of 44 years and 18 days, in his last

Qatar Stars League The Qatar Stars League (; abbreviated as QSL), known as Ooredoo Stars League for sponsorship reasons, is the top level football league in Qatar football league system. Contested by 12 teams, it operates on a system of promotion and relegation wi ...

game in 2024 against

, which ended in a 2–1 loss.

International career

After years of playing in Qatar, he became a naturalized Qatari citizen and was therefore eligible for the Brazilian and Qatari national football teams. In August 2015, Tabata was selected for the Qatar national team's camp in Austria. His unofficial debut came in a friendly against Austrian club

LASK Linz Linzer Athletik-Sport-Klub, commonly known as LASK (), or Linzer ASK, is an Austrian professional football club based in Upper-Austrian state capital Linz. It is the oldest football club in that region, and plays in the Austrian Football Bundes ...

on 17 August 2015. He made his official debut in a

FIFA World Cup The FIFA World Cup, often called the World Cup, is an international association football competition among the senior List of men's national association football teams, men's national teams of the members of the FIFA, Fédération Internatio ...

qualifier match against

Hong Kong Hong Kong)., Legally Hong Kong, China in international treaties and organizations. is a special administrative region of China. With 7.5 million residents in a territory, Hong Kong is the fourth most densely populated region in the wor ...

in a 2–0 win.

Career statistics

Club

International

:''Scores and results list Qatar's goal tally first, score column indicates score after each Rodrigo Tabata goal.''

Honours

Santos *

2006 2006 was designated as the International Year of Deserts and Desertification. Events January * January 1– 4 – Russia temporarily cuts shipment of natural gas to Ukraine during a price dispute. * January 12 – A stampede during t ...

2007 2007 was designated as the International Heliophysical Year and the International Polar Year. Events January * January 1 **Bulgaria and Romania 2007 enlargement of the European Union, join the European Union, while Slovenia joins the Eur ...

Al Rayyan *

: 2015–16 *

Emir of Qatar Cup Emir of Qatar Cup (), also known as the Emir Cup, but changed to Amir Cup starting in 2019, is an association football tournament played every season by all first and second division teams in Qatar. The tournament is played in a knockout system, ...

2013 2013 was the first year since 1987 to contain four unique digits (a span of 26 years). 2013 was designated as: *International Year of Water Cooperation *International Year of Quinoa Events January * January 5 – 2013 Craig, Alask ...

Sheikh Jassim Cup The Sheikh Jassim Cup () is an annual men's super cup competition in Qatari football held between the winner of the Qatar Stars League and the Emir of Qatar Cup. History The inaugural Sheikh Jassim Cup was held in 1977. Prior to the 2014 She ...

2012 2012 was designated as: *International Year of Cooperatives *International Year of Sustainable Energy for All Events January *January 4 – The Cicada 3301 internet hunt begins. * January 12 – Peaceful protests begin in the R ...

, 2018 Al-Sadd * Qatar Stars League:

2020–21 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 ...

, 2021–22 *

Qatar Cup The Qatar Cup (formerly known as Qatar Crown Prince Cup) is a tournament in men's football Football is a family of team sports that involve, to varying degrees, kick (football), kicking a football (ball), ball to score a goal (sports), go ...

2020 The year 2020 was heavily defined by the COVID-19 pandemic, which led to global Social impact of the COVID-19 pandemic, social and Economic impact of the COVID-19 pandemic, economic disruption, mass cancellations and postponements of even ...

2021 Like the year 2020, 2021 was also heavily defined by the COVID-19 pandemic, due to the emergence of multiple Variants of SARS-CoV-2, COVID-19 variants. The major global rollout of COVID-19 vaccines, which began at the end of 2020, continued ...

* Emir of Qatar Cup:

2014 The year 2014 was marked by the surge of the Western African Ebola epidemic, West African Ebola epidemic, which began in 2013, becoming the List of Ebola outbreaks, most widespread outbreak of the Ebola, Ebola virus in human history, resul ...

* Sheikh Jassim Cup:

Individual * Qatar Stars League Player of the Year: 2011–12, 2015–16 * Qatar Stars League Top Scorer: 2015–16

References

External links

santos.globo.com
*
gaziantep27.net
{{DEFAULTSORT:Tabata, Rodrigo 1980 births Living people Footballers from Araçatuba Men's association football midfielders Naturalized citizens of Qatar Qatari men's footballers Qatar men's international footballers Qatari people of Brazilian descent Qatari people of Japanese descent Brazilian sportspeople of Japanese descent Brazilian men's footballers Campeonato Brasileiro Série A players Süper Lig players Qatar Stars League players Qatari Second Division players Paulista Futebol Clube players Esporte Clube São Bento players Esporte Clube Santo André players Ferroviário Atlético Clube (CE) players Associação Atlética Internacional (Limeira) players Treze Futebol Clube players Ceará Sporting Club players Esporte Clube XV de Novembro (Piracicaba) players América Futebol Clube (RN) players Campinense Clube players Goiás Esporte Clube players Santos FC players Gaziantepspor footballers Beşiktaş J.K. footballers Al-Rayyan SC players Al Sadd SC players Grêmio Recreativo Serrano players Brazilian expatriate men's footballers Brazilian expatriate sportspeople in Turkey Expatriate men's footballers in Turkey Expatriate men's footballers in Qatar 21st-century Brazilian sportsmen 21st-century Qatari sportsmen