Carney (Sheffield United) and Sterjovski (Derby County) have struggled to make an impact in the English Championship and could be on the move during the northern summer as they look to get their respective careers back on track.

Socceroos coach Pim Verbeek has made it clear he wants his players involved regularly at club level in the lead up to the World Cup finals - and Carney and Sterjovski are listening.

"Sheffield United is a great club but I need game time before the World Cup and Pim has told me that," said Carney. "No-one is questioning my ability to play for Sheffield United, it's just the way I play ... it's hard to fit in and I might have to move on.

"I just need a bit of stability and someone who backs me and get my confidence back up and I think I'll be flying. My agent has met with the chairman at Sheffield United and he's really keen on me, it's just the gaffer (manager Keith Blackwell).

"He thinks I am an international player and says I'm probably our best player but I just don't fit in his plans."

A guarded Sterjovski indicated he will moving on from the Rams but refused to say where.

"We will find out more in the next few days. I can't say anything at the moment but hopefully in the next few days I will know," he said. "It was a frustrating first six months but when (Derby manager) Nigel Clough came in things improved quite a lot."

"I would have liked to have started more games and I feel like I deserve that but it didn't happen that way. I know I need to be playing regular football heading into such an important year."

Sterjovski got the sluggish Socceroos going with a goal after 55 minutes against Bahrain.

Carney ensured victory with Australia's second two minutes from full-time, icing a win that was laborious at times and lacking any real intensity or spark.

"I think we had a little bit of jetlag and we started off a little sloppy but once we got our legs going and our confidence going we were a lot better," Carney said.

Sterjovski added: "I thought we played okay in patches and considering we made so many changes (eight) to the side that played Qatar, we can be reasonably happy.

"But we are not getting carried away. We know we can and must improve before taking on Japan (in Melbourne) next week."