Ange’s “good form and playing regularly” policy, although more honoured in the breach sometimes, means that anyone with an Australian passport can realistically dream of the green and gold, irrespective of the league they play in (although I’m fairly sure he’d draw the line at my Over 45s comp).

Besart Berisha will have an Australian passport this week, and Ange is the coach who brought him to Australia in the first place. Could it happen? I’m sure there are other qualification rules that need to be satisfied but it’s a long time since he played for Albania. He also has the handicap of being one of the most disliked players in the A-League, but I think we all appreciate his ruthless qualities. I’d have no objection if he scored the winning goals against Iraq and UAE in a couple of months.

Likewise Alex Brosque. A tad long in the tooth but in outstanding form and scoring goals for fun. He’s still very fast also which more than balances the age ledger, and is calm in front of goal as only experienced strikers tend to be. I‘d be okay with his selection also.

We are supposed to be looking to the future, but the World Cup finals are only 18 months away and the qualifiers continue right now. Timmy’s on record as being desperate to get to Russia and in all honesty, despite being 37 (and pushing 39 in June/July next year) he’s one of the few strikers we can really rely on to get into good places and score goals. He continues to deserve his place but for how much longer?

And what about the younger strikers?

Jamie McLaren has been hot and cold this season and hasn’t quite looked the part (yet) for the National Team. He’ll continue to get chances, as will Tommy Juric and Apo Giannou. But what about Andrew Nabbout?

This is where I put on my “good judge” hat, with one or two caveats.

His good points: fast, athletic, good shot, calm finisher for a young bloke, good in the air, likes to run at defenders, physical, gets into dangerous positions and seems to have a hint of that Berisha ruthlessness. He’s in excellent form right now and maybe just needs to do it for a little while longer to be taken seriously as a potential Socceroo.

His bad points: there’s only one as far as I can tell. When he has the ball at his feet in the final third, he doesn’t get his head up. He likes to cut inside from the wings and nearly always draws two defenders. That’s the time he should be slipping the ball back out to his wide men who are then in the clear, but he never sees them. He may play a ball to the far winger (the way he’s facing) or look for a tight ball into the inside channels, but never plays the easy outside ball that he has opened up with his fearsome running.

And if he did sometimes play that reverse ball to the wide man, the wide defender would be in two minds and might stay with the wide man, leaving Nabbout extra space if he decided to take on the defence himself.

Defenders, this season, are terrified of Andrew Nabbout’s brutal runs and he throws them into a panic several times a game. In response they cluster about him like moths to a flame but if he could just learn to get his head up and understand that the really dangerous space is away from him (where defenders are fewest), he’d be a lot more valuable to the Jets.

And maybe to Australia.

Adrian’s latest book Political Football: Lawrie McKinna’s Dangerous Truth is in the shops right now or available through Booktopia. Adrian also wrote Mr Cleansheets.