Bile-Enoch Banza (born 4 February 2000) is a Finnish professional footballer who plays as

right winger A midfielder is an outfield position in association football. Midfielders may play an exclusively defensive role, breaking up attacks, and are in that case known as defensive midfielders. As central midfielders often go across boundarie ...

for Ykkösliiga club KTP.

Early life

Born in

Helsinki Helsinki ( or ; ; sv, Helsingfors, ) is the Capital city, capital, primate city, primate, and List of cities and towns in Finland, most populous city of Finland. Located on the shore of the Gulf of Finland, it is the seat of the region of U ...

, Finland, Banza is of Congolese descent. His family had fled the war in

Zaire Zaire (, ), officially the Republic of Zaire (french: République du Zaïre, link=no, ), was a Congolese state from 1971 to 1997 in Central Africa that was previously and is now again known as the Democratic Republic of the Congo. Zaire was, ...

(present-day

Democratic Republic of the Congo The Democratic Republic of the Congo (french: République démocratique du Congo (RDC), colloquially "La RDC" ), informally Congo-Kinshasa, DR Congo, the DRC, the DROC, or the Congo, and formerly and also colloquially Zaire, is a country in ...

), and moved to Finland: his father in 1991 and his mother and sister in 1995. He also has four brothers who were also born in Finland. Banza received Finnish citizenship in 2018.

Career

Banza started at the age of 5 at

Malmin Palloseura Malmin Palloseura (abbreviated as MPS) is a Helsinki-based football club that was formed in 1948. The club's first team has been playing mostly in the Second and Third Divisions. Currently the team plays in the Kakkonen which is the third tier of ...

(MPS), before he joined HJK Helsinki youth sector at the age of 8. He made his Veikkausliiga debut with HJK first team in 2017 when he was 17 years old, against

PS Kemi The Palloseura Kemi Kings is a Finnish football team based in the town of Kemi, who are currently playing in the Kolmonen. The club have spent three seasons in the top flight in their history. History The club was established on October 21, 1999 ...

. On 7 January 2019, Banza was loaned out to

KPV The KPV-14.5 heavy machine gun (KPV is an initialism for Krupnokaliberniy Pulemyot Vladimirova (Large-caliber Machine gun Vladimirov), in Russian as Крупнокалиберный Пулемёт Владимирова, or КПВ) is a Soviet de ...

for the

2019 Veikkausliiga The 2019 Veikkausliiga was the 89th season of top-tier football in Finland. Helsingin Jalkapalloklubi were the defending champions. New league format Veikkausliiga adopted a new league format for the 2019 season. Each team played against each othe ...

season.HJK lainaa kaksi nuorta ja lahjakasta pelaajaansa – toinen sarjanousijan ja toinen hopeajoukkueen riveihin
hs.fi, 7 January 2019 In June 2020, he was then loaned out to Veikkausliiga club RoPS for the rest of 2020 season. In April 2021, Banza signed with Norwegian club Raufoss IL. On 15 April 2022, Banza joined

AC Oulu AC Oulu (ACO) is a Finnish football club based in Oulu. Formed in 2002, the club have played two seasons in Finland's highest football league Veikkausliiga and seven seasons in the second highest league Ykkönen. The club are currently playing ...

on loan for the

2022 File:2022 collage V1.png, Clockwise, from top left: Road junction at Yamato-Saidaiji Station several hours after the assassination of Shinzo Abe; 2022 Sri Lankan protests, Anti-government protest in Sri Lanka in front of the Presidential Secretari ...

season. On 26 July 2022, Banza was further loaned out to

Järvenpään Palloseura Järvenpään Palloseura (abbreviated JäPS) is a football club from Järvenpää, Finland. It was formed in 1947 and is based at the Järvenpää keskuskenttä. Background In six decades JäPS evolved from a small local team into one of Finlan ...

(JäPS) in Finnish second tier Ykkönen. He stayed with JäPS also for the

2023 season 3 (three) is a number, numeral and digit. It is the natural number following 2 and preceding 4, and is the smallest odd prime number and the only prime preceding a square number. It has religious or cultural significance in many societie ...

. On 1 March 2024, Banza joined Finnish Ykkösliiga club Kotkan Työväen Palloilijat (KTP) on a permanent contract.

Career statistics

Honours

HJK * Veikkausliiga:

2017 File:2017 Events Collage V2.png, From top left, clockwise: The War Against ISIS at the Battle of Mosul (2016-2017); aftermath of the Manchester Arena bombing; The Solar eclipse of August 21, 2017 ("Great American Eclipse"); North Korea tests a ser ...

2018 File:2018 Events Collage.png, From top left, clockwise: The 2018 Winter Olympics opening ceremony in PyeongChang, South Korea; Protests erupt following the Assassination of Jamal Khashoggi; March for Our Lives protests take place across the United ...

* Finnish Cup:

2020 2020 was heavily defined by the COVID-19 pandemic, which led to global Social impact of the COVID-19 pandemic, social and Economic impact of the COVID-19 pandemic, economic disruption, mass cancellations and postponements of events, COVID- ...

Individual * Ykkösliiga Player of the Month: April 2024KTP:n Enoch Banza Ykkösliigan huhtikuun pelaaja
Finnish FA, 8 May 2024

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Banza, Enoch 2000 births Footballers from Helsinki Living people Finnish men's footballers Men's association football forwards Finnish people of Democratic Republic of the Congo descent Finland men's youth international footballers Finland men's under-21 international footballers Helsingin Jalkapalloklubi players Klubi 04 players Kokkolan Palloveikot players Rovaniemen Palloseura players Raufoss IL players AC Oulu players Järvenpään Palloseura players Kotkan Työväen Palloilijat players Veikkausliiga players Ykkönen players Kakkonen players Norwegian First Division players Finnish expatriate men's footballers Expatriate men's footballers in Norway Finnish expatriate sportspeople in Norway Naturalized citizens of Finland Ykkösliiga players Malmin Palloseura players