Anna Harrington, AAP
It’s a seemingly timeless question: who is the Socceroos’ next gun striker?
The national team’s ongoing search for a consistent goal-scoring number nine has long proved frustrating.
Hard-working Mitch Duke currently leads the line, while the likes of Adam Taggart, Jamie Maclaren, Bruno Fornaroli and Apostolos Stamatelopoulos have all been involved to various degrees.
But there are three A-League Men young guns jostling to give Australia some hope for the future: Brisbane’s Thomas Waddingham, Melbourne City’s Max Caputo and Western United’s Noah Botic.
Waddingham, 19, is likely to make his mark first.
City’s Caputo, 19, will miss the start of the season with a broken ankle, while Botic, 22, is returning from a foot stress fracture that prematurely ended his 2023-24 campaign.
Waddingham, who earned overseas interest last year after seven league goals, also has the backing of coach Ruben Zadkovich.
“I’ve said it so many times, Tommy represents the club perfectly. He’s a great fit,” Zadkovich said.
“We’ve got big expectations on his ceiling and where he can get to and we’re working really hard with Tommy one-on-one to try and fix some areas in his game where we think he can improve.
“The best part is he just wants to train and work, he wants to listen.
“I’m really excited to see Tommy again this season and he’ll be up front leading our line for sure.”
United are hopeful Botic, who scored 11 goals across the past two seasons, returns via the bench against Wellington in round one but will be patient with their prized asset.
Coach John Aloisi is sure Botic will want to show his quality stacks up against his fellow young strikers.
“Noah’s that type of person where he wants to be the best and he’s got a good attitude and keeps on wanting to learn,” Aloisi told AAP.
“So even in this period where you could probably feel sorry for yourself, he’s doing all the right things and then when we do analysis, he’s the one answering questions.
“That’s the attitude – that Noah wants to be better all the time.
“So maybe that’s (competition) something that drives him but he’s definitely driven.”
Botic has hit the gym hard during his recovery and Aloisi is confident his bigger, stronger frame will help him kick on – as will playing alongside recruit Hiroshi Ibusuki.
“Noah was a pretty late developer physically and now you can see that he’s a stronger, more robust type,” he said.
“We can even see it in his speed.
“Then Noah’s always had that quality and you can see it as he starts training again with the team – you go ‘oh, that’s the quality that we know of Noah’.
“So that’s exciting and we’re excited about it because he missed a big chunk of the season just as he started to hit form.”
