Socceroos coach Tony Popovic does not want to dampen expectations and is adamant his 26-man Australia team for the FIFA World Cup does not just ooze future potential, but can be good right now.

Australia’s World Cup preparations escalated as Popovic named his squad and the team moved into their new digs for the tournament in Oakland ahead of their opener against Türkiye next weekend.

Almost a third of the squad are 23 years-old or younger, including stars Jordan Bos, Alessandro Circati, Nestory Irankunda, first-choice centre forward Mo Toure.

Meanwhile, 18-year-old centre-back Lucas Herrington is pushing for a starting berth after another assured performance, while uncapped Serie A winger Cristian Volpato could feature after his international eligibility came through in the nick of time.

From Australia’s previous World Cup squads, only Ange Postecoglou’s 2014 team featured as many 23 and under players and none of the others had more than four.

But as hopeful as Popovic in this team’s potential down the line, he sees this team as one that can make an impact immediately.

“I don’t want to dampen anyone’s expectation,” he told reporters in Oakland on Sunday.

“Will they be better in four and eight years? Without a doubt.

“But that’s not to say they’re not good enough now. If they weren’t, I wouldn’t play them, and I wouldn’t have them in the squad.”

Popovic leaned on his own history as a Socceroo - looking back to their 2005 qualification play-off win over Uruguay after being bullied by the same opponent four years earlier - as to why this tournament can be a great learning tool for the future while not precluding them from making an impact now.

“It would be easy for me to say we’re looking to the future with a lot of these players, and water down expectation — I don’t want to do that,” he said.

“We should keep the expectation high now. A lot of the decisions that have been made since we qualified automatically have been to look for players’ young potential, but they they’ve all earned it.

“These boys are chosen now in the 26 to play now... I want them all to give me a headache every week, and I believe in these young boys.”

In whittling his team down from 30 to 26, Popovic was forced to hold tough conversations with Martin Boyle, Joe Gauci, Kye Rowles and Brandon Borrello, all of whom have left camp after missing the squad.

Boyle’s omission comes with the 33 year-old having missed the previous World Cup due to injury.

“Those discussions are never easy, and there’s no perfect way to give someone that type of news. Once they hear the news, how much they hear after that, I’m not sure really. In terms of whatever I say after that, it can be a blur to most of them,” Popovic said.

But on the other hand, he was overjoyed at telling the likes of veterans Mat Ryan and Mathew Leckie they would be equalling an Australian record by going to their fourth tournaments, or some of the aforementioned youngsters they are headed to their first.

“It’s definitely something I’ll always remember. seeing their faces,” Popovic said.

“You see both sides of the spectrum; you see the joy on Matthew Leckie’s face and Aziz Behich, like, ‘wow I’ve done this again’ and then you see the numerous kids that we have glowing from ear to ear, jtrying to process what’s going on here.

“The senior ones know what’s coming. The youngsters are just thinking about it, dreaming about it, until they probably get to the stadium, and then they realise what it’s all about.