Berisha achieved his total when he was part of the all-conquering Brisbane Roar side, and he did so when the A-League boasted 11 teams (not the current 10), and thus gave him three more regular season matches to boost his totals. Smeltz notched his total in a 10-team competition when he was playing for the now defunct Gold Coast United. Fornaroli has simply been outstanding since signing in the off-season. It took him just over half a season to score goals against every single A-League club - a feat some players take years to achieve. If we discount the season-long cameos of former marquee players such as Dwight Yorke and Alessandro Del Piero, superstars who lit up the competition for a short while and were then gone, Fornaroli stands above all others on the scoresheet, and, save perhaps for Archie Thompson in his pomp, above all others in performance terms too. A childhood contemporary of Barcelona and former Liverpool frontman Luis Suarez and current Paris St Germain striker Edinson Cavani, Fornaroli had extensive experience in Latin America and Europe before arriving in Melbourne. As one agent - who did not wish to be named - put it on Sunday: "Ask any coach in the A-League if they would prefer to have the Del Piero who came to Sydney or the Fornaroli who is currently at Melbourne City and they would all say they would prefer Bruno."

What makes Fornaroli so hugely influential is his all round game. Some goal-scorers are supreme predators, the so called "fox in the box" type. They have sharp reactions, have a nose for where to be and often magically appear in the right place at the right time. They don't care how they get their goals. A nudge off the kneecap or a deflection of their back will do just as well for them as a beautifully struck shot, a graceful header or a well judged lob. Smeltz would be the best exemplar of that type amongst the aforementioned sharpshooters. Others are the more bullocking type, the players who get there because they are supreme competitors and have an indomitable will to win. They fight hard, they run hard, they work hard, they contest every physical challenge, they never give up, and they are always having a go. Berisha is the best exponent of this type. Thompson, in his heyday, differed from those. Yes, he got his share of close range goals, but he often relied on his pace and ability to cut in from wide areas. He was at his best in Ernie Merrick's counter-attacking team when Grant Brebner, Fred and Kevin Muscat ran the midfield and Victory struck hard and fast with balls through the channels for Thompson and Danny Allsopp to run on to.

Thompson was a better dribbler than Berisha and Smeltz and he was certainly more versatile - he could operate as a winger or as an advanced midfielder - but he may not have been quite as pure a finisher as the others. Fornaroli can, on what we have seen, combine the qualities of all his predecessors and get all kinds of goals in all kinds of ways. The Uruguayan ranges far and wide, in the way Thompson and Berisha do. He has close control and dribbling skills that few could match. He is strong, like Smeltz and Berisha, surprisingly so for a man of his size, and is also good in the air where his sense of timing and placement, more than height, is his best asset. He has game smarts, versatility and tactical awareness superior to all three. Fornaroli drops deep, deeper than most strikers, and is as happy to start a move as any midfielder, as long as he can be on the end of them. His workrate is prodigious. He makes runs, doubles back to help out the midfield, gets a foot in or unsettles an opponent and is then off seeking space in the forward third.

His technical ability allows him to operate in tight spaces and find that fraction of a second or half a metre needed to get a shot in, often when the goalkeeper may not be expecting one. He is also very disciplined. He rarely gets carded and has not been sent off. At his current rate of scoring Fornaroli could conceivably set a new benchmark of 25 goals. City coach John Van 't Schip is all too aware of the gem he possesses. "He's been important," he said. "Up front he's always available to play the ball into. He fights, he's the first one to roll up his sleeves ... to go out and do the dirty work. And of course he's scoring goals. He's been great for us and the A-League.

"Foreigners always have time to adapt and learn the new country. The advantage with him was that he was a player who had already been in Italy, Greece and Argentina ... he was worldly-wise you could see that when he came to the club. "He came in with his Uruguayan mentality, he made himself accepted within the group by the example he made in the training and the games," said Van 't Schip after the 3-0 win over Sydney. That is why if City are to win the league Fornaroli simply has to stay fit and well. And if the club is serious about becoming a consistent challenger at the top, then it has to do everything in its power to keep him out of the clutches of rich Chinese teams who are likely to come prowling. Pay him close to $1 million-a-year, make him the marquee man: City's short-term destiny could lay at his feet.