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Tonight, eighth placed Jets’ fate will be decided in the final round of the A-League when they host Western Sydney Wanderers at Hunter Stadium.

The full strength Jets will aim to win and hope other results go their way in order to make the six.

The Wanderers just need a point to claim the Premiership with second placed Mariners to play later in the weekend.

And in a spot of luck for Newcastle, a rearranged fixture list has given the squad extra time to recuperate from niggling injuries after they had last weekend off.

With just an intra-club match played instead, the squad is rested and fully fit for their biggest game of the season.

“It’s probably a good situation for us. It’s a real chance for us to make a real statement in front of our own fans in this the last game of the regular season

“We all know how big of an occasion it is. These are the moments you train hard for,” said Zadkovich following training on Wednesday.

“We can sort of treat this like a one-off Cup match and really analyse how the Wanderers go about things to counter-act their play and work on what we want to do,”

And the 26-year-old Wollongong-born Jets skipper took a philosophical approach to how the last round may end.

“You know it’s funny. It comes down to that last game and we might or might not make the finals. But I still think irrespective of that it’s been a successful year because we’ve blooded a lot of younger players with bright future.

“Hopefully some of them will be future Socceroos. We’ve built for something this year and if we look back at the season we could’ve got a little more out of some games and maybe then this shouldn’t be such a do-or-die game for us,” he said.

“But in my eyes it’ll be a successful season – some others may think a little different. Not making the finals will hurt a lot but for now, I’m staying positive.

“At this stage I’m really confident we can get a result and the rest is going to be fate, I guess.”

The former Derby, Sydney FC midfielder is nonetheless wary of an injury-riddled Western Sydney Wanderers. 

Wollongong-born Zadkovich said the Wanderers' run was no fluke. 

“They’ve a great mentality with a real good leader in coach, Tony Popovic," he said. "He really instils that belief and I’m sure they’ll come here to sew up the Premiers Plate and we’ve got everything to play for too.

“We’re all very pumped and it’s great for the A-League what all those [Wanderers] fans are doing. We want them out here in full force as we do our own supporters."

Newcastle are at full strength for the clash with star striker Emile Heskey back in the squad announced by coach Gary Van Egmond.

Heskey has missed the last three games with a calf complaint, joining Zadkovich and Zenon Caravella on the returning from injury list.

That list includes newly capped Socceroo striker Adam Taggart. After a calf niggle in recent times, the Socceroo striker has relished some extra time to get over it at this late stage of the campaign.

“We obviously had quite a few games in a row," said Taggart after training yesterday. "There were a few of us who needed a couple of days to get the body back in shape and refresh the legs.

“Overall [the break] is a massive positive.”

Taggart said he was now 100% ready for the game in terms of his fitness.

The Jets trained on Thursday morning. After some sharp ball work, the team worked on shape and transitions as well as defending and attacking at set-pieces.

Jets officials are confident of attracting their biggest crowd of the season with an 18,000-20,000 attendance expected.

The figure is set to include an influx of Wanderers fans said to number around 6000-8000.

Taggart echoed coach Gary van Egmond’s comments that the Wanderers can hurt any team on the counter.

He added: “If you look at the stats they never really have the bulk of possession but they’re always dangerous when they’re going forward. 

"We’ve done a lot of work in training this week so we can overtake that and stop their counter.”

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