Last weekend’s Premier League action was a landmark occasion for Brighton & Hove Albion’s Kaoru Mitoma, as his goal in Brighton’s 3-3 draw with Brentford saw the winger surpass both Shinji Kagawa and Shinji Okazaki in being the highest-scoring Japanese player in the Premier League with his seventh goal of the campaign.
With Brentford having opened the scoring after just 10 minutes at the Amex Stadium thanks to former Leeds United defender Pontus Jansson, eleven minutes later Mitoma slotted himself behind the Brentford defense to receive a long ball from Brighton goalie Jason Steele, before performing a sublime lobbed shot that went above the head of Brentford goalkeeper David Raya and into the goal.
The match then went into an all-out goalfest afterwards – Ivan Toney regained Brentford’s lead just one minute after Mitoma’s equalizer, before the Seagulls slotted home another equalizer courtesy of Danny Welbeck in the 28th minute. Ethan Pinnock then gave Brentford the lead for the third time four minutes into the second half, only for Alexis Mac Allister’s 90th minute penalty to salvage a point for Brighton.
Former Manchester United man Kagawa had scored six goals for the Red Devils in the 2012/13 season, before Okazaki matched said tally with Leicester City in the 2017/18 campaign. Both men had to concede their crown as the Premier League’s highest-scoring Japanese player to Mitoma, with his goal against Brentford being his seventh in the current league season. With Brighton still having a few more games to play for and considering Mitoma has ten goals already to his name in all competitions, there’s a chance that the former Kawasaki Frontale winger would add more to his tally.
“It’s great to surpass them, but I can get a lot more,” said Mitoma after the match, as quoted from the Japan Times and Kyodo.
Europe-chasing Brighton’s next league game will be away to AFC Bournemouth in a South Coast Derby on April 5th.