João Pedro
Centre-Forward · Brighton · Brazil
About João Pedro
João Pedro is the Brazilian striker who scored 20 goals in his debut season at Chelsea (2025-26), won the FIFA Club World Cup and was voted the club's Men's Player of the Season. A powerful, technically accomplished centre-forward who graduated from Watford (ENG)'s ranks, he combines physicality, aerial ability and link play with a genuine goal threat.
João Pedro's story
Born in Ribeirão Preto
João Pedro was born in Ribeirão Preto, São Paulo, on 26 September 2001. His father, former Botafogo-SP midfielder Chicão, was largely absent through his childhood after a 2002 conviction as an accessory to murder. His mother, Flavia, raised him alone, and moved with him 450 miles to Rio de Janeiro at around age ten so he could join Fluminense's academy.
A teenager's leap to England
Watford signed him from Fluminense as a teenager in 2019-20. He has said the first six months in England were spent unable to talk to anyone. His mother and grandmother, Dalva, relocated with him to Hertfordshire; he later dedicated his first Premier League goal, in November 2021, to his late stepfather, Carlos Junior.
Breaking through on the south coast
Brighton signed him in 2023, where Roberto De Zerbi's possession-based system sharpened his hold-up play and movement in the box, the platform that persuaded Chelsea to move for him two years later.
Chelsea's Player of the Season
His first season delivered 50 appearances, 20 goals and 6 assists, including a bicycle kick against Nottingham Forest and a hat-trick at Aston Villa. Supporters voted him Chelsea's Men's Player of the Season for 2025-26, the same year he lifted the FIFA Club World Cup.
Snubbed, recalled, and sidelined
Left out of Carlo Ancelotti's Brazil squad for the 2026 World Cup despite a stellar season, he called the omission part of the game and signed a contract extending his Chelsea future to 2034 that August. Recalled to the national side in September 2026, he was ruled out again by injury before the squad even assembled.
Did you know?
- 🇧🇷 João Pedro is eligible for both Brazil and Italy through his heritage, but Brazil has always been his only realistic international choice.
- 💰 Chelsea paid an initial £55 million to sign João Pedro from Brighton in July 2025, rising to £60 million with add-ons: one of the Premier League's biggest fees for a striker that summer.
- 👨👩👧👦 He carries tattoos of his mother Flavia's and grandmother Dalva's names, and kisses them before every match.
- 🎓 João Pedro made his senior debut for Fluminense in 2019 aged 17, before a move to Watford the following year.
- 🎉 His hands-raised goal celebration began as a friend's joke during his Brighton breakthrough: "I never forget about my friends and where I come from," he has said of its meaning.
- 😄 Fans coined "JP Morgan" and "CPR" for Chelsea's front three of João Pedro, Cole Palmer and Morgan Rogers. He rejected both, laughing: "We need to find a very good nickname!"
- 🤝 Close friends with Cole Palmer, João Pedro has been credited by reporters as one of the players helping bridge language-line cliques in Chelsea's dressing room.
- ⚽ Despite 20 club goals in 2025-26 alone, João Pedro is still waiting for his first goal in eight caps for Brazil.
- 💃 New Chelsea signings perform an initiation dance for team-mates; João Pedro's routine went viral. "They just make me dance," he said of the tradition.
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