OSAKA, Aug 11 (Kyodo/APP): Kunishige Kamamoto, widely regarded as the best striker in Japanese football history after scoring an all-time men’s record 75 goals in 76 games, died Sunday of pneumonia, the Japan Football Association said. He was 81.
The Kyoto native won the bronze medal at the 1968 Olympics in Mexico, where he was the tournament’s top scorer with seven goals, helping Japan achieve their best finish to date at the Summer Games.
Known for his ferocious shot and all-around scoring abilities modeled on Portugal icon Eusebio, Kamamoto set a Japan Soccer League record with 202 goals and 79 assists and finished as the top scorer seven times during his 17-year career with Yanmar Diesel, now Cerezo Osaka, starting in 1967.
“After half a century, no player has emerged coming close to him,” said former JFA chief Saburo Kawabuchi, the 1964 Tokyo Olympian in football, as well as the inaugural J-League Chairman. “The term ‘unparalleled player’ fits him best.”
His 75 goals remain top for Japan by some distance, with Kazuyoshi Miura, still going strong as a professional at age 58, placing second with 55 goals and former Leicester City favorite Shinji Okazaki third on 50.
Kamamoto fell ill with viral hepatitis in 1969 as Japan failed to qualify for the 1970 World Cup, and Kamamoto missed the next two tournaments as well, something he recalled as “the only regret” of his career.
A potential move to a German Bundesliga club, which would have made him the first Japanese player in Europe, never materialized despite the backing of former Japan technical advisor and future Bayern Munich Champions Cup-winning manager Dettmar Cramer.
Kamamoto became the first Japanese to play for the World XI in 1980, featuring alongside Dutch star Johan Cruyff, while Brazil legend Pele and West Germany’s Wolfgang Overath took part in his retirement match in 1984 at Tokyo’s National Stadium.
After managing Matsushita Electric, later Gamba Osaka, from 1991 to 1994, Kamamoto served as JFA Vice President for a total of eight years from 1998.
He was a House of Councillors lawmaker for one term from 1995 and received the Order of the Rising Sun, Gold Rays with Neck Ribbon, in 2014.
Kamamoto held more than 1,200 football clinics across Japan after his retirement, and one of the boys who took part, future Japan attacker Keisuke Honda, recalled his excitement at facing the star.
“When it comes to ability and the way of thinking one needs to have as a striker, we can still learn a lot from Mr. Kamamoto,” the former AC Milan man said