Matildas coach Joe Montemurro has effectively admitted he would prioritise players based overseas rather than A-League Women's talent in future Australian national team selections.
Montemurro unveiled his 26-player squad for the October international window on Thursday, but only two of them currently feature in the ALW: goalkeepers Chloe Lincoln and Courtney Newbon.
The lack of domestic league selections comes as many high-profile Matildas have made their name through the ALW, such as Sam Kerr, Ellie Carpenter and Caitlin Foord.
However, the ALW is not a professional competition, which is hindering its ability to match the US and European leagues' standards.
With more money, regular games and better opportunities to play against the world's best players, Australian athletes have flocked overseas.
When Montemurro was asked if players in international leagues would get priority selection over those in the ALW for future camps, he detailed how the foreign competitions better match his criteria for choosing a team.
"They need to be tested at the highest levels possible," he said.
"Because then players are attuned to the regularities of high-level football, and that's what overseas at the moment is giving them.
"It's a situation where it's important for us, and it's a situation that's important for even the players to become professional footballers.
"There must be that consistency. There is that challenge, that day-to-day."
The stark selection warning echoes Chelsea FC's Carpenter, who previously said that a move back to her home country wasn't on the cards, adding that the ALW is in a "disappointing" place.
To make matters more difficult, next year's FIFA Women's World Cup begins in June, two months after the domestic competition's regular season finishes.
"It does make it difficult in terms of what we're trying to endorse in terms of regular game time and regularity of football," Montemurro said.
"If the A-League is not active, it does not help us move into the tournament.
"But we don't want that to be the be-all and end-all of a player not coming in."
Montemurro urged ALW clubs to focus more on developing high-performance facilities and investing in a long-term direction for how they want to grow the women's game.
He said the Australian Professional Leagues (APL) also needs to address its player contracts, which are currently in dispute.
AAP revealed in July that athletes had voted down two proposed collective bargaining agreements, although the APL has offered to provide a road map to full-time professionalism for the ALW.
