Courtney Newbon started the A-League Women season as Central Coast's injury replacement goalkeeper.
Now Melbourne Victory's emergency signing, Newbon will attempt to help her new club end the Mariners' campaign.
Newbon played in Central Coast's first four games amid an injury to goalkeeper Sarah Langman, before moving on when they signed former Victory custodian Casey Dumont.
But injuries to Miranda Templeman, then Matildas great Lydia Williams, forced Victory to sign Newbon and fellow goalkeeper Geo Candy.
The 23-year-old has made 12 appearances for her new club, starting 11 - almost as many as the rest of her career to date.
Along with her Mariners stint, Newbon played eight games for Western Sydney between 2019 and 2021, and five for Perth in 2021-22.
"I like to say that I'm riding the wave and just going with whatever comes my way," Newbon told AAP.
"But as you can imagine, it's not something I necessarily expected that was going to happen at the start of the year.
"But I'm just taking it in my stride and just having fun with it."
Newbon admitted it would be a little bit strange playing the Mariners in Sunday's elimination final at the Home of the Matildas in Bundoora.
"But I also know what my job is for this weekend and obviously that is to try and get the three points with Victory," she said.
"I've just gotta focus on my job and we can laugh about it after, hopefully."
The 23-year-old has thrived working alongside Williams, who is sidelined after ankle surgery.
"It's great. Honestly, when the opportunity came up to work under Lyds, it was something that I couldn't really turn down," she said.
"To learn off the player that has been in the national team spot for pretty much as long as I can remember is obviously something pretty exciting."
After the Victory beat Sydney FC 4-0 on the final day of the regular season to seal their finals berth, Newbon is daring to dream.
"A lot of the talk around all the girls was very much like 'pressure makes diamonds and we've got our backs against the wall now and now we need to show what we're made of'," she said.
"People like to call it 'the Victory way of doing things'.
"That was my first taste of that but it was good preparation, like it was very much an elimination final before the elimination final.
"It's something that everyone dreams of, being able to ultimately lift the trophy at the end of the competition.
"To do it in a season like one that I've had would be something that I could have never thought was gonna happen - and I'd definitely take it if it came."
