FIFA.com sharpshooters Michael Olunga Kenyan Club: Kashiwa Reysol Japan

 

Michael Olunga

Nationality: Kenyan
Club: Kashiwa Reysol (Japan)
Age: 26
2020 record: 28 goals in 32 matches

Michael Olunga, who began his career with Liberty Sports Academy in his native Kenya, has, at 26, already had his passport stamped a number of times and managed to find the net in several different countries, including Sweden, Spain, China and his current adopted home, Japan.

 And it was after arriving in the Land of the Rising Sun in 2018 that he began to score more regularly and in more clinical fashion. “I attribute the success to hard work and staying focused even when you think everything is lost,” he told FIFA.comin April. “It’s about believing you are capable of achieving great things and doing wonders on the pitch.”

In 2020, that work certainly paid dividends, because the talented Kenyan racked up no fewer than 28 goals in 32 games, topped the J-League scoring charts, and led promoted Kashiwa to seventh place at the conclusion of the 2019/20 campaign.

Olunga’s targets for 2021 will likely include maintaining the pace he set this year, and perhaps adding to his international scoring total in the upcoming qualifying matches for Qatar 2022, where the Kenyans find themselves in a group with Mali, Uganda and Rwanda.

Did you know?
In 2018, Olunga became the first Girona player to notch a hat-trick in La Liga. Not content to sit on his laurels, in 2019 he scored eight goals in Kashiwa’s 13-1 victory over Kyoto Sanga.