Mainz striker Shinji Okazaki became Japan's most prolific scorer in a single season in Europe's top leagues on Saturday when he bagged his 14th goal of the Bundesliga campaign in a 2-0 win over Nuremberg.
On target twice in last weekend's 4-2 defeat to Borussia Dortmund, the 28-year-old hitman headed in a curling free kick from Johannes Geis to open the scoring on the half-hour mark.
Okazaki's 14th goal saw him eclipse the previous single-season record set by Manchester United's Shinji Kagawa, who scored 13 when he played for Dortmund in the 2011-2012 campaign.
"For the goals that I need to score in order to survive to go down in the record books make me happy," said Okazaki, who scored more international goals than any other player in the world in 2009, hitting the target 15 times for Japan.
"I hadn't been delivering results in Germany so I am thankful to the manager and the team. The Europa League is one of our targets and I think the fans are expecting that."