With the tie evenly poised at 0-0 after a first-leg stalemate in Korea, the Wanderers are on the cusp of their greatest accomplishment, arguably surpassing their effort of making back-to-back grand finals in their first two seasons.

Given the Wanderers had to balance their ACL campaign through the tailend of a domestic campaign and the start of another only adds to the degree of difficulty but Popovic believes his side will improve from their solid showing in the first leg.

"We expect to be better and to improve. It's been a few weeks since that game and we expect our fitness to have improved a bit more," he said on Tuesday. "We are in pre-season but we expect to be sharper, we expect to be mentally better and in front of our home crowd, we expect a lot more from ourselves. That doesn't mean FC Seoul can't raise their game as well, and if both teams play to their maximum, then it should be fantastic.

"These are the games you want to be a part of and we've been fortunate as a club to have a lot of big games in our short history."

Only one Australian club has ever made the final, Adelaide United in 2009, and the Reds' coach at the time, Aurelio Vidmar, has already said the Wanderers can go one better to create Australian football history.

"There is no higher competition for a club side in the A-League. Playing in Asia is the pinnacle, just as it is in Europe to win the [UEFA] Champions League," he said. "We're one game away from having that as a possibility but we can't look far ahead and certainly I won't look past this game. The focus is clearly on [Wednesday] night to get the job done and once we do that, we can talk about the next step."

While the magnitude of the occasion isn't lost on the Wanderers' coach, he believes his players won't be overawed by the occasion, nor the capacity crowd which is set to create a cauldron of noise.

"We'd expect our fans to be behind us and will be trying to help us get over the line to win the game," Popovic said. "The players have already played many big games at this stadium. They know what pressure is and they can handle pressure.

"You have to have belief in your game plan, you have to have belief in each other and we've shown here before we have not panicked when we've needed to score. If that's the case again tomorrow, I don't fear having any anxiety or panic from the players."

Aiding the cause is the return of three key players after suspension – strikers Tomi Juric and Brendon Santalab and defender Shannon Cole.

"Of course it's a [boost] – in the first leg we were one short on the bench," Popovic said. "Having these three players back, fit and fresh, gives us more options. That will definitely help us."

While the Wanderers are aiming to create their own history, FC Seoul is out to make it six years in a row where a Korean side has made the final, a record unlikely to be matched for the forseeable future.

"There's a lot of things [Korean] sides are good at but they know how to play in this competition," Popovic said.

"All Korean teams are very structured and organised and they've had a lot of success [winning the ACL a record 10 times]. "FC Seoul have improved a lot in the second half of the year and they're here to make sure they go through to the final. We're here to do that same."