Meanwhile in 2014, an entire world away, Sydney FC was struggling to fill the marquee void left by Alessandro Del Piero. The Italian superstar had left for India, which had joined the likes of the MLS and China in out-bidding the A-League for glamorous talent.

The Sky Blues were forced to search elsewhere for footballers who could put bums on seats. Eventually, they found them in the most unlikely of places.

In 2014, Ninkovic wasn’t the only Eastern European about to leave for sunny Australian shores. Before he departed his homeland for a fresh start down under, the Serb fleetingly united with countryman Milos Dimitrijevic, a 30-year-old Red Star Belgrade midfielder, who was witnessing equally disturbing scenes in the Serbian capital.

It was a fortuitous meeting for Australian football.

The Eternal Derby (Red Star Belgrade vs Partizan Belgrade) is world-renowned for the unparalleled passion it produces – the byproduct of half a century of political tension between Serbian communist and military factions.

This passion is largely displayed in two ways. Firstly, there’s the pyrotechnics. What the South Americans have in tifo and choreography, the Serbians more than make up for in fireworks (that often devolve into just fire).

Starting fires at the opposition's home ground is a common feature of the Eternal derby

Then, there’s the derby’s bloody history of violence. Countless deaths are directly attributable to this match, stemming from a time when Serbian dictators used football as a form of controlled, sanctioned aggression. Even now, stabbings and beatings in the crowd are not uncommon, with violence occasionally spilling onto the pitch.

Dimitrijevic played in four Eternal derbies, Ninkovic two, before they traded in the daunting showpieces, hostile ritual and repulsive savagery of Belgrade football for a league that provided quiet, sun-drenched afternoons in front of 5,000 people at Bluetongue Stadium.