Adelaide United coach Guillermo Amor facing tough choices over Asian Champions League squad

SURELY lightning won’t strike twice for Adelaide United’s key playmaker Marcelo Carrusca when the Reds announce its 2016 AFC Champions League squad on Tuesday night.

SOCCER - A-LEAGUE - Adelaide United v Newcastle Jets. Coopers Stadium. Daniel Mullen and Marcelo Carrusca. Photo Sarah Reed.

SURELY lightning won’t strike twice for Adelaide United’s key playmaker Marcelo Carrusca when the Reds announce its 2016 AFC Champions League squad on Tuesday night.

In 2012 the Argentine failed to make the imports cut when the Reds made it all the way to the quarter-final with Serginho van Dijk, Evgeniy Levchenko and Jeronimo Neumann filling the foreign quota.

Carrusca didn’t kick up a fuss when former coach John Kosmina made the call after the Argentine tore a calf muscle before the second half of the international club tournament kicked off.

“I hope so, fingers are crossed,’’ Carrusca said about representing Adelaide in the Champions League.

“We’ll see what happens but I’m looking forward to playing in this competition.

“We are waiting for the list.

“We don’t know who is going to be in it.”

But current boss Guillermo Amor will on Tuesday make the toughest decision of his senior coaching career.

Amor must submit his final squad of 30 players for Adelaide’s Champions League sudden-death clash, probably against China’s Shandong Luneng, at Coopers Stadium on February 9.

Only three imports on the Reds roster can be named with Adelaide also having an ace up its sleeve in Serginho van Dijk.

The Dutchman with an Indonesian passport is expected to be named as United’s Asian import in a 3+1 ruling (a maximum of three foreigners allowed that are registered outside of the Asian Football Confederation with another from inside the AFC but outside of Australia).

But who will Amor cut and will it impact Adelaide’s impressive A-League campaign where the Reds have now gone nine games undefeated.

Adelaide has five imports — Iacopo La Rocca, Isaias, Marcelo Carrusca, Pablo Sanchez and Sergio Cirio. Amor’s decision is a tough one to make.

Originally published as Adelaide United coach Guillermo Amor facing tough choices over Asian Champions League squad