Australian soccer fans hoped it would be a marriage made in heaven - a Socceroos legend playing on home soil in the A-League.
But now they fear it could be a divorce made in hell if Tim Cahill looks to leave Melbourne City in the January transfer window to give himself more chance of first team game time.
It's a battle Cahill is unlikely to win - but it may not come to that if common sense prevails.
Cahill is understood to have spoken to City boss Warren Joyce following his dramatic outburst after the Socceroos' World Cup win on Wednesday night, in which he suggested he might want to quit the Melbourne club in search of more game time to help him be in tip-top shape for the tournament in Russia.
But if the striker can force his way back into the starting line-up, play well and help drive City towards the A-League grand final he should have no worries about his form or fitness leading into the World Cup.
Should they make the title decider, or even the penultimate week of the season, City would be playing right into late April/early May, which is the time that Ange Postecoglou (or whoever may be Socceroos coach) will be calling his players into pre-World Cup camp.
Surely Cahill, with all his talent, experience and ability would back himself to be a major part of any City charge to the play offs and potential title glory?
If he can't, then the question would have to be asked: if he isn't good enough to warrant a start in the A-League, how can he be expected to be a front line forward for his country at such a big tournament as the World Cup?
Cahill is not one to shirk a challenge, as his career, particularly those early years when against the odds he carved a footballing life out for himself at Millwall, shows.
And he has not become the iconic figure he has - the greatest Socceroo, a hero at Goodison for his wholehearted performances and goalscoring feats for Everton - without being a supreme professional.
He looks after his body, he keeps himself in top shape and he has done everything he can to wring the last gram of potential from his person.
But being such a good professional, he must surely recognise that in any facet of the game there can be no guarantees.
A coach might like a player, he might think his skills are great. But he cannot give him an assurance that he will in all likelihood start matches. He cannot, in fact, give him any assurances about game time of any kind. That is simply how the sport works.
A coach needs to be able to tailor his team's tactical requirements to the job at hand. He must have the freedom to pick the sort of players he wants and needs for a particular job, a particular game or in the overall context of the club's requirements. Joyce is entitled that basic professional courtesy.
That is not to say Cahill's fears aren't understandable.
He is on the cusp of something truly extraordinary. Only a few times in the history of the game - through the exploits of Pele and the Germans Uwe Seeler and Miroslav Klose - have players appeared, and scored, in four World Cups. That is the prize within Cahill's grasp right now, so no wonder he is desperate to give himself every chance to attain it.
But surely his best chance of doing that is knuckling down, working hard and doing his best for his current team. He will get opportunities, and it's then up to him to take them.
While Cahill is enormously popular with fans he is a Melbourne City/City Football Group employee, and the club is under no obligation to help him or Australia's World Cup plans, although the PR benefits are obvious.
But it is hard to see how it would be anything but ruinous for club discipline and teamwork, not to mention Joyce's authority, were Cahill to come out on top and force them to pick him in the starting XI each week. The club would be said to have buckled when a gun was held to its head.
If the relationship did end in acrimony, Cahill's options would be limited.
He could try to join another A-League side, but would they give him guarantees of game time?
He could look to negotiate his way out of his three year deal - the last of which, next season, was scheduled to launch him on a coaching career - and try to find another club overseas.
But no big teams will be interested in him, and would he want to go to the Middle East, China or somewhere else in South East Asia for barely a few months?
Relationship counselling is not always the answer to emotional problems, but in this case, especially for the Socceroos, it is to be hoped that Cahill realises the situation and City welcome him back into the fold.
