Marco Tilio desperate to get his career back on track with Melbourne City

Chasing game time, a Socceroos attacking weapon rejected the chance to return to Europe, instead opting to stay in the A-League.

Socceroo Marco Tilio has revealed he defied the wishes of his Scottish club Celtic and national coach Graham Arnold to remain on loan at Melbourne City for the 2024-25 A-League season.

The electrifying winger, who turns 23 on Friday, is in the second year of a five-season deal with Celtic after leaving City on a transfer deal worth more than $2 million to join the Glasgow giants in June last year.

However, the move didn’t go to plan, Having suffered a quad injury while on Olyroos duty before his arrival in Scotland, Tilio was immediately behind the eight-ball.

Injuries continued to affect Tilio and by February, and without having made an appearance for Celtic, the decision was made to loan him back to City.

But his luck hardly changed, with the former Sydney FC prodigy making only four A-League appearances before his season ended prematurely in early April with a re-aggravation of his quad injury.

“It really tested my character,” Tilio said.

“I had so many setbacks. I was coming back from injury and within a week I was getting injured again for whatever reason.

“It was a tough year being out for about eight months of the 12 … because I’d had that rise in the previous three seasons to get that move to Celtic.

“Then I went there, I was injured and ever since that injury, I never really found my feet again.

“It really tested how much I wanted to be a footballer. There were times when you were so down on yourself and think it’s your fault.”

Marco Tilio hopes to shine for Melbourne City this season. Picture: Paul Kane/Getty Images

However, Tilio said he was now in a much better space mentally and physically, and to remain in a good state of mind about his football, he opted to stay on loan with City for the upcoming A-League season despite it not being Celtic’s preference.

“I spoke with Celtic and they wanted me to go back there and do the pre-season, but for myself it was about getting myself in the right place and the right mindset to eventually want to go back overseas,” he said.

“For me, missing so much football, I didn’t want to risk going back overseas and not playing again, so I made the decision to stay at City with the opportunity to play consistent games stay fit and put myself in a really good spot, come the end of this loan spell, to go back.

“There were (other loan) opportunities in Europe to go back and explore but … knowing the competition in Europe, I wanted to have a year of playing consistently.

“There’s no guarantee of that anywhere, but for my best chance, I stayed here.”

Tilio also consulted with Socceroos boss Arnold before making his decision.

“I ultimately told him what I believed was best for myself. He would have liked for me to be overseas in Europe or somewhere playing, but … I made the decision to stay here and put myself in the best frame of mind to get back to where I was before I left,” he said.

Tilio’s decision will make it hard for him to be selected in the Socceroos squad for next month’s FIFA World Cup qualifiers against Bahrain and Indonesia as the A-League season doesn’t start until October.

However, his priority is returning to full fitness and playing well on a weekly basis for a City side desperate to return to the top of the A-League after a disappointing 2023-24 campaign.

“That’s pretty much my goal – to play consistently and play really well, and then all the other things will take care of themselves,” said Tilio, who was confident City would bounce back.
“We’re in a really good spot at this time in the pre-season, and come round one, we’ll be really competitive this season going for first or second.”

Originally published as Marco Tilio desperate to get his career back on track with Melbourne City