Gold Coast United then signed Minniecon to become the club’s inaugural youth marquee, despite issues away from football threatened to end a promising career.
"It was just a bit of personal problems off the field, every young player and person goes through those things," said Minniecon.
"It's just a matter of how you deal with it and I didn't deal with it too well at the time,” Minniecon said.
Fortunately, the Western Sydney Wanderers came to his rescue and the Young Socceroos began to shed the kilos.
"When I first came down I was 80 kilos, I wasn't in a good area of my life at that time, but I worked hard and got myself down to 68, 69 kilos."
The upcoming World Cup may be too soon for Minniecon to make an international comeback but if he continues to show the display he has done for the past 18 months, a return to the green and gold might not be far away.
