Afrim Taku

Early career

Taku began his football career as a 13-year-old when he joined the KF Tirana academy, where he progressed through the ranks before eventually being loaned out to Albanian First Division side Skrapari for the 2008–09 campaign in order to gain first team experience. He made his professional debut in the First Division with Skrapari, where he featured in 11 league games as he helped the side narrowly avoid the relegation playoff places by a single point.

Tirana

He returned to his parent club Tirana but did not feature at all in the club's 2009–10 campaign, but he was promoted to the first team by head coach Nevil Dede ahead of the 2010–11 season, and he made his debut for the club in the Albanian Cup against his former side Skrapari on 20 October 2010 in a 1–0 away win in which Taku played the full 90 minutes of. He made his Albanian Superliga debut on 20 November 2010 in a 3–1 home win over Elbasani, where he came on as a 76th-minute substitute for Mladen Žižović. Dede left the club soon after and Mišo Krstičević took charge of the team, and the Croatian coach handed Taku his first Superliga start on 30 April 2011 in a 2–1 loss to Flamurtari Vlorë. He made five league appearances in his debut season with Tirana as the club finished in a disappointing 5th place, and he made four cup appearances as Tirana went on to beat local rivals Dinamo Tirana in the final to win the trophy, which was the first major trophy of Taku's career.

Breakthrough…

After an impressive season with Tirana, on 7 June 2015 Taku received his first international level call up in the Albania national team by coach Gianni De Biasi for the friendly match against France on 13 June 2015. He was an unused substitute during the entire match, as Albania beat France 1–0 at Elbasan Arena to receive a historic result. Taku rejoined the Albania national team in March 2017, where among Keidi Bare was invited by coach Gianni De Biasi to replace Taulant Xhaka and Amir Abrashi which left the gathering for the Friendly match against Bosnia and Herzegovina on 28 March 2017. He didn't manage to play in the game which finished as a 2–1 loss.

Club

As of 23 December 2017

Taku has stated that his role model and favourite footballer is former Argentine footballer Javier Zanetti.