Fernando Karanga

Luiz Fernando da Silva Monte (born 14 April 1991), commonly known as Fernando Karanga, is a Brazilian footballer who plays as a forward for Dalian Yingbo.

Career

Early career

Karanga began his professional career with Santa Cruz, but failed to cement a first team place and spent loan spells with Bragantino and Belo Jardim before joining Trindade on a permanent basis.

CSKA Sofia

Karanga signed a two-and-a-half-year deal with CSKA Sofia on 2 February 2017. On 29 April he scored a goal in the Eternal derby of Bulgarian football, netting the third in CSKA's 3–0 win over Levski Sofia.

Karanga began the 2017–18 season with a goal in the first league game against Slavia Sofia on 15 July, which ended in a 1–1 draw. Two weeks later he scored his first hat-trick in Bulgaria during a 6–2 away win over Botev Plovdiv. Karanga continued his scoring run in the following games, scoring 12 goals in his first 11 league matches of the campaign. He also scored on his Bulgarian Cup debut against Botev Vratsa in the 1/8 finals. The Brazilian finished the year with a total of 23 goals in 30 league games for the Reds, in addition to 2 games and 1 goal in the Bulgarian Cup. He continued his fine performances during the first months of 2018, but sustained an injury in the second leg of a Bulgarian Cup match against Levski Sofia on 25 April (after a rough tackle), which sidelined him until the end of the season and was a factor in him finishing in second place for the top goalscorer award in the league.

Karanga is the highest scoring foreign player in the league fixtures of The Eternal Derby with four goals under his belt. He quickly emerged as a favourite with the CSKA Sofia fans.

Henan Jianye

On 12 July 2018, Karanga was transferred to Chinese Super League side Henan Jianye (later simply known as Henan) for a reported transfer fee of $4 million. He suffered from serious splenic injury in October after a match against Beijing Guoan, and received splenectomy. He discharged from hospital in November, and returned to Brazil for further treatments and recoveries.

In March 2019, he was loaned to Nacional. In July 2019, he recovered from the previous incident, and rejoined Henan Jianye.

On 1 July 2023, he mutually terminated his contract with Henan.

Jinan Xingzhou

On 19 July 2023, Karanga signed with China League One club Jinan Xingzhou.

Return to CSKA Sofia

On 16 January 2024, Karanga returned to CSKA Sofia. During his second stay with the "redmen", he managed to find the net on 5 occasions, becoming the foreign player with the most goals in the league for the team, but his stint was marked by disciplinary issues, resulting in two red cards, for the latter of which, received in a heated match against Ludogorets Razgrad, he was handed a six-match ban. He left the team in June 2024, upon the expiration of his contract.