FORMER Newcastle United frontman James Troisi on early morning wake-up calls in Turkey, match-fixing and making the Socceroos grade.

In recent years Turkey has been a common hunting ground for Socceroo hopefuls. At one point Lucas Neill, Harry Kewell, Mile Jedinak, Bruce Djite, Michael Petkovic and James Troisi all plied their trade in the passionate Turkish league. Currently just the latter, alongside potential Socceroo Ersan Gulum, are left in the league.

Adelaide-born Troisi, who spent several years as a youngster at EPL side Newcastle United with limited first-team chances, is hoping that he can use this transition period for the Socceroos as an opportunity to push for a place during the upcoming World Cup qualifications across Asia in the next few months.

After moving to Turkish side Genclerbirligi in 2008, Troisi managed to grab his first career hat-trick in January 2009, against 2008 Turkish Cup winners Kayserispor. His rivals on the day liked what they saw and signed the young Aussie in the next closed season.

While his time at Kayserispor has been plagued with injury, after a solid pre-season with no problems, the 23-year-old is confident he can help his side, who spent the first half of last season near the summit of the league before finishing sixth, to European qualification this time around.

Troisi has also found favour with new Socceroo coach Holger Oseick, who selected him for the recent friendly with New Zealand in Troisi’s hometown of Adelaide. A decent display, capped with a penalty conversion, would have done Troisi’s future chances no harm. While the World Cup qualifiers, and then Brazil 2014, all offer young Aussie players the ultimate carrot of motivation, it will not be easy to claim a spot. There are also a few players keen to make a spot in the Socceroos’ front-line their own. Troisi will need to stay fit and be firing to play a part in Holger’s plans.

We spoke to Troisi from Turkey about making the international grade, the match-fixing scandal which has delayed the start of the Turkish season and 5am wake-up calls from the local mosque!

You have now called Turkey home for the past three years. How is life treating you there? Anything in particular you enjoy about the country?
It is completely different to most places in the world. It took a little time to settle in, but now I am used to it. It makes you grow as a person as it can be a tough place to live, but I love the weather and the food is really good too. I can’t complain too much. 

How is it “completely different to most places” as you mentioned?
It is a Muslim country and that takes a while to get used to. They have to pray five times a day, so there are mosques within walking distance of most houses. The mosques play music five times a day, the first time at 5am in the morning and then lastly at 10pm at night. I have got used to that, but it did take a while!

The Turkish season was due to start in August, before a match-fixing scandal pushed the start date to September. How has that affected preparations this pre-season?
It is frustrating. Putting the season back a month means we had a 12-week pre-season. We were back on 27 June for training and the match-fixing scandal did not surface until 3 July. It is just about maintaining our fitness and making sure we do not over do it. We had some extra friendly games to get us ready too.

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