New Zealand hot-shot Shane Smeltz is looming as a potentially decisive finals weapon for Gold Coast United at the end of a record-setting A-League soccer season.
The striker, who notched his second hat-trick of the season in Saturday's 5-1 thumping of Brisbane, has already scored three more goals in a season
than anyone in A-League history with seven regular season games remaining.
And former national league striker Andy Harper says his rare finishing ability can prove United's trump card in cut-throat finals matches.
"One-off matches are won by match-winners," said Harper, now a football commentator and analyst.
"We saw Archie Thompson in the second season grand final just blitzing Adelaide with five goals and Shane Smeltz has that capacity.
"He has the capacity to be in a game and score three or four, which makes him worth so much to any team. Not only in the home and away season but also in decisive games."
But the former Sydney FC chief executive doesn't think that Smeltz can necessarily lay claim to being the best striker the A-League has ever seen.
His strikes against the Roar took his tally for the season to 18 and on to the verge of becoming the first player to notch more than 20 goals in a season.
But Harper believes while Smeltz is a fantastic finisher, others such as Melbourne's Thompson provide a different kind of threat to the Gold Coast star.
Thompson set the previous A-League record of 15 goals in a season in 2006-07.
"He [Thompson] seems to have the best nose for goal, but Archie Thompson poses a threat in other areas."
