Hérita Ilunga

Early career

Aged 13, Ilunga started training with Amiens SC, staying with the Somme-based club for four years before moving to Stade Rennais. Ilunga moved to Spain, aged 20, where he joined Espanyol. In Barcelona, the left-back featured exclusively for Espanyol's B team in the Spanish Third Division, but he still did enough to catch the eye of Saint-Étienne coach Frederic Antonetti, who took him back to France, initially on loan, in 2003. Ilunga spent four seasons at the Stade Geoffroy-Guichard, making 135 appearances for Les Verts and winning the club's player of the season award.

Toulouse

The summer of 2007 saw Ilunga move to Toulouse, who had qualified for the 2007–08 UEFA Champions League. The defender appeared at Anfield as Toulouse lost 5–0 on aggregate to Liverpool at the third qualifying round stage. His time at Toulouse was "horrible" in his first season when the club was 17th place in Ligue 1, avoiding relegation after having a struggling season. Toulouse dropped into the UEFA Cup, with Ilunga making six appearances as Le Tef beat CSKA Sofia on away goals before falling at the group stage. Toulouse also endured a difficult campaign in Ligue 1, only avoiding relegation on the final day of the season by beating Valenciennes 2–1. The following season (2008–09), Ilunga seems out of favor with new coach Alain Casanova, the latter preferring Jérémy Mathieu as a left back. After two months without playing a single minute and approaches from different…

Ilunga was part of the Congolese 2004 African Nations Cup team, who finished bottom of their group in the first round of competition, thus failing to secure qualification for the quarter-finals. Ilunga helped DR Congo reach the quarter-finals of the African Cup of Nations in Egypt in 2006. The Leopards beat Togo and drew with Angola before being eliminated by the host nation in the last-eight. Ilunga scored his first goal for his country in a 2010 FIFA World Cup qualifier against Egypt in Cairo on 1 June 2008, but it was not enough to prevent the DR Congo being eliminated from the competition at the second qualifying round stage.

International goals

Appearances in major competitions