When the Socceroos qualified for the World Cup, Lewis Miller was an absolutely rusted on selection as the side’s right wingback.
But when he suffered an awfully timed achilles rupture and his World Cup dream ended, one of life’s great cliches was invoked: when one door closes, another opens.
The right wingback berth was wide open at that point. Fran Karacic, perhaps, had his nose in front; Sammy Silvera and Jason Geria had been used, while Nathaniel Atkinson, who started game 1 in 2022 had drifted out of consideration.
Jacob Italiano has been grinding quietly in Europe for six years; a talent who left Perth Glory for Borussia Mönchengladbach in 2019 but who hadn’t quite made that jump into the national team.
That all changed in October, 2025 for the friendlies against Canada and USA.
Thrown in the deep end, he thrived.
Out of nowhere, Australia suddenly had a solution to a major headache.
In the months since, he has become such an assumed selection to start at this World Cup, that the speed of his ascent into the XI has been overlooked. He has arguably been the revelation of the Tony Popovic era.
“With the the lead in to the World Cup, I’d obviously moved to to Austria to try and get regular game time, try and put myself in the window of being involved in one of the camps, which I managed to do,” he said.
“Going into that camp I knew that was my chance to put my best foot forward, show that I’m an option for the boss.
“I guess that’s what I did and here I am now.
“So it all worked out but it was definitely my shot. I knew it was my shot to show myself.”
Knowing it’s your moment is one thing, seizing it is another.
“The thing was try and not get too excited about everything, try and not get too kind of overwhelmed or looking forward too far.
“At the end of the day it is football. You’re going obviously into a higher intensity, higher level, different environment, but it’s still football. So I knew that I had done my thing at my club. So I went in with the mentality of just continuing that. Just playing my football.
“That was the best way to show myself; not try and do too much, not try and show too much, just show why I got selected and continue on from that.”
The excitement might have inevitably got to the Grazer AK player, because when he returned to Austria for the first time after an international window, he suffered an injury setback.
Still, during that period, Popovic continued to sing his praises despite his absence.
“It was obviously a big boost in confidence for me,” Italiano explained.
“After the USA game I realised okay, I can do it at this level. They had some really good players on the pitch at the time. It was a different level to what I was used to, but I showed that I was capable of dealing with it and performing, performing quite well and that was a big confidence boost.
“That is the time when maybe injuries can come – when you’re on top of the world and you feel like you’re invincible. I went back to the club and I probably wasn’t as clever in terms of managing my loading and things like that in training.
“Then my calf went with all the travel and new excitement and everything. That’s something I’ve learned from now, because I was hoping that there will be a time again where I’m coming back to the club from a camp and I need to manage everything a bit better, which I managed to do.
“It was definitely a setback but the confidence I had from the October campaign can kind of push through.”
This campaign is incredible reward for perseverance, working through the COVID period alone abroad, niggly soft tissue setbacks, years making a case in the German club’s reserves and then a bout of glandular fever. Italiano is one of those who has stuck it out abroad when others most definitely would have returned home, even though he had A-League offers at the time he decided to move to Austria.
“There was definitely a few turbulent years there, a bit of adversity in and out of football,” he said. “I probably spent a lot more months than I would have hoped not on the pitch.
“It was definitely a tough time for myself, my family, everyone, because I’d made the the move over there to push on my career and show what I was capable of and it started quite well and then different things happened for different reasons and had to come out of them.
“I showed that mentally I was tough enough to get over that; get over those setbacks.
“The move to Austria I think was a really good one. It got me playing consistently at (what is) still a good level and gave myself an opportunity to show that I was ready to push for this World Cup.”
This interview was conducted prior to the opening game win, where Italiano was outstanding on the right flank. Even before that night, just being in this camp, had it made that perseverance worthwhile?
“A hundred percent. I know I’ve had to work hard for it. I’ve had to go through some tough times for it, so it definitely feels extra special.”
The unique setup of this Socceroos side is its requirements for wingbacks, rather than fullbacks, with extraordinary engines and the ability to link with the midfielders and attack.
It is a different art form but one Italiano enjoys.
“It’s definitely a demanding role,” he explained.
“But I think with my profile and you see like Bosy (Jordan Bos) on the other side and Aziz (Behich) and and Kai (Trewin) who plays there, we all kind of have the capacity to get up and down the pitch for a long time of the game, whenever we’re attacking, you want to be in the back post with the chance for a goal.
“Whenever you’re defending you want to be at the back post as well to stop them. So you need to be able to get up and down the pitch.
“Sometimes it’s difficult when Jordy Bos is sprinting down the other end, getting past three or four, and you’re thinking, ‘I’ve got to get to the back stick in case he crosses it in!’
“It’s a role I’ve been playing at my club as well, which has helped me.
“I think that also helps my situation. My club plays a similar system, so I was used to it in a way and obviously there’s different things in each system that I still had to learn but I had a basis which helped me and I enjoy the role a lot, I’m able to show my strengths through the role.”
We saw more of an attacking intent against Turkiye than we did in the other two friendlies and Italiano and Connor Metcalfe, in particular, were aggressive, with Bos caught in a ding dong battle with Zeki Celik.
“We want to be high and wide and pushing the opposition fullbacks back and thinking about us going the other way,” Italiano said.
“Obviously at times in the game it’s going to be the other way where we’re going to have to defend well and respect their good footballers and at the start of the game they might be fit in firing.
“But I think we’ve shown in these friendly games that we’re really fit, we’re really strong. If we can get through that, which we’ve shown we have been able to get through that, not giving up too many big opportunities, especially against Mexico, I think they didn’t really create anything, once we get through that we’ve shown that we can come out the other end and really do some damage ourselves as well.”
Prophetic words, as that’s exactly what happened against Turkiye, and Jacob Italiano, a veteran of eight months in the national side, was a key cog in that happening.