Al-Duhail SC striker Michael Olunga has revealed how difficult it was to compete with Jesse Were and other strikers at Tusker after the 2012 Kenyan Premier League season.
Olunga joined the Brewers after shining in the secondary schools' national games in Mombasa when he was at Upper Hill School and has explained how Were, Ismael Dunga, and Moses Arita were stiff competitors.
"My wish was to play for Gor Mahia, but at that time, I thought I was too young for that move and that is why I took the Tusker route. Remember that they had won the 2012 season, and coach Robert Matano promised me opportunities and offered confidence," Olunga told Jalang'o TV.
"At Tusker, it was not easy because they were league champions and it meant they had experienced strikers like [Andrew] Tololwa, [Jesse] Were, [Ismael] Dunga, Moses Arita. It was difficult, but it was a good step, I believe. The good thing is that there was the KPL U19 and that is where I featured most and I emerged as the top scorer."
Olunga moved to Gor Mahia in 2015 and helped them win the league title with an unbeaten run. He emerged as the club's top scorer and second on the KPL scoring chart behind Were. Then he struggled to settle at Swedish club Djurgardens IF.
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"I decided to sign for the Swedish club because, since I was young, it has been my hope that one day I would play in Europe. But in the beginning, life was not easy for me because I arrived during the winter season," revealed the former Kashiwa Reysol centre-forward.
"For the first six months, I scored no goals. It was difficult because I was coming off a season in Kenya where I scored 40 goals in total in 2015, and now I'm in a six-month drought. I got accustomed to things around me and went ahead to score 12 goals in 13 games thereafter.
"The coach gave us a promise that he would only play those who showed determination. I grabbed the opportunity and scored two goals in the first game and, since it was always hard to change a winning team, I played in the next game and scored two goals."
Olunga joined Al Duhail - his eighth career club - in 2021 after emerging as the top scorer in the J1 League with Kashiwa Reysol in the 2020/21 season.