Luciano Batista da Silva Júnior

Luciano Juba arrived at Bahia for nothing. His contract at Sport Recife ran out, and on 1 September 2023 he signed as a free agent — this after Bahia had offered Sport four million reais to buy him out early, and Sport had said no.

The player they got had come up through amateur football in Serra Talhada, in the interior of Pernambuco, before joining Sport's youth set-up in 2017–18 and working through the U-20 and U-23 sides. He made his first-team debut in 2020. A loan to Confiança in 2021 brought 16 Série B matches before Sport recalled him that summer. In 2022 he played 57 games in Série B and scored 10 goals. In 2023 he played nine more, and won the Campeonato Pernambucano, before the move to Salvador.

He went straight into the Bahia starting eleven — 14 appearances and a goal in Série A that first season, then 37 games and three goals in 2024, then 35 and six in 2025. He has 20 matches and seven goals so far in 2026, with 19 starts. He has a Copa do Nordeste (2024) and a Campeonato Baiano (2025) with the club.

In November 2025 Carlo Ancelotti called him into the Brazil squad for friendlies against Senegal in London and Tunisia in Lille. He sat on the bench for both and remains uncapped.