Largely unknown when he joined Newcastle in the pre-season from Brisbane Roar’s youth team, Champness has since appeared in all 14 games, scoring three goals, including one in last week’s 2-all draw with A-League leaders Sydney.

But the arrival of Argentine winger Pato Rodriguez has created a welcome selection dilemma for Jets coach Ernie Merrick, who  suggested that 20-year-old Champness could ultimately be the player to make way.

“Joe Champness is in his [Rodriguez’s] position,” Merrick said.

“Joey is under pressure now. Joey has to put Pato under pressure. Players like Joey are going to learn so much from these players.’’

Merrick said the arrival of Rodriguez and Newcastle’s other new recruit, Riley McGree, who is in China with the Australian under-23s, would create healthy competitions for positions. 

“Their aim is to give me a headache in team selection,” he said. “I always look for consistency of performance, involvement for 90-odd minutes. If you have really good players competing against really good players, you have a good team.”

Whether Merrick rushes Rodriguez into the starting line-up for Tuesday’s derby clash with Central Coast at McDonald Jones Stadium remains to be seen.

Rodriguez, who was released by mutual agreement from AEK Athens on December 8, trained for the first time with Newcastle on Friday.

Merrick said “the worst thing you can do is throw him in too early” but added that if the 27-year-old trained strongly on Monday “he will definitely get some game time Tuesday”.

Meanwhile, Newcastle’s Nick Cowburn scored for Australia’s under-23s in their 2-1 friendly win against Thailand in Shanghai on Saturday.