From Luciano Figueroa to Diogo Luis Santo: The JDT strikers that Jonathan Herrera has to emulate

In the world of football, there are no clubs that will ever get all of their player transfer signings to be unprecedented success. Every football club will have good buys and bad buys, from the top clubs to the bottom clubs.

Thierry Henry is remembered as one of the greatest strikers to have ever played the game of football and what a signing he turned out to be for Arsenal while Mohamed Salah was signed from AS Roma and has since helped Liverpool to finally put their hands on a Premier League trophy.

On the other end of the scale, Alexis Sanchez was one of the pillars of the Arsene Wenger team before Manchester United took him away but the Chilean would turn out to be a flop as he failed to rediscover his form at Old Trafford. Likewise Real Madrid had a signing to forget when they took Nicolas Anelka from the Gunners.

There are many factors which can lead to a player being a success or a failure at any club, whether that is because the player had trouble adapting to a new country, culture or club; or because the player signed did not have the sufficient required qualities for that particular level.

Seven time Malaysia Super League champions Johor Darul Ta’zim (JDT) has had their fair share of foreign strikers since the club was rebranded back in 2013 and like the other clubs, has had a mixture of success and disappointments with the 11 strikers that has come before Jonathan Herrera.

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Alhaji Kamara, Jeronimo Barrales, Brian Ferreira and Jorge Santos Silva were the strikers that flopped at JDT with every single one of those players only lasting only for a short period at the Southern Tigers before quickly being shown the exit door after failing to impress.

Spanish star and European Championship winning striker, Daniel Guiza was the first to arrive in Johor Bahru in 2013 and while his stay was short, his impact was huge. His signing immediately put JDT on the world map and the Spaniard contributed a decent eight goals while only staying for half a season.

His replacement was a very different figure in Leonel Nunez who had the talent but perhaps not the right physique to be a long term success but still played a huge role in helping JDT to the FA Cup final. Similarly, Lebanese Mohammed Ghaddar had a decent stint during the 2017 season, helping himself to 11 goals that season.

Then there are those who rightly fall into the extreme success category in Luciano Figueroa, Martin Lucero and Diogo Luis Santo. Figueroa played a pivotal role in guiding JDT to become the first and only Southeast Asian side to lift the AFC Cup in 2015 and has since taken on the managerial role at the club and even had a stand renamed in his honour.

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The youngest of the trio, Lucero endured a slow start to the 2016 campaign but ended the season with an incredible 27 goals as he grew into a fearsome striker with every passing match. That year, JDT went an entire Super League season without a single defeat and the club would benefit even further from the Argentine whose exploits enabled him to be sold to Tijuana for a huge profit.

Last but not least, Diogo was arguably the best of the bunch despite him not having garnered as many goals as Lucero did during his time even though the former played a season more for JDT. This was a player in his absolute prime and not just a pure finisher, someone who can perform various functions for the team - the perfect team player.

It remains to be seen which former JDT star that Herrera would be seen as similar with and which category he will fall under when his time at the club will be up but for sure, the 29-year-old Brazilian will have plenty of positive precedence that he can look to replicate once he dons the red and blue jersey.