Melbourne Heart manager John van ‘t Schip wants his players to take control of their own fate rather than wait for their luck to change.
Melbourne Heart manager John van ‘t Schip wants his players to take control of their own fate rather than wait for their luck to change.
The Hyundai A-League’s newest team has suffered from some cruel late twists in their second season.
They conceded a last-minute goal to lose 3-2 to Newcastle Jets in their campaign opener.
Three matches later, Nicky Carle’s 90th-minute equaliser earned Sydney a 1-1 draw, costing Heart their first victory of 2011/12.
And they are still the only team without a win after having Simon Colosimo sent off and giving up the lead to draw 1-1 away to Adelaide United last week.
Next up for Heart is a rematch with the Jets at AAMI Park on Saturday.
Van ‘t Schip concedes his team have suffered more than their fair share of ill-fortune in five matches played, but the Dutchman is not interested in taking the blows lying down.
“Over a whole season if you keep working hard and believing in the things you’re doing you will be unlucky and you will be lucky,” Van ‘t Schip said.
“And if you look at it like that we’re heading towards more luck because we had already (in) a lot games been unlucky.”
“But that’s the way it is. You have to work hard and I believe also that it’s not always lucky or unlucky, you can work for that.”
Drawing on his own experience with Eredivisie powerhouse Ajax, Van ‘t Schip believes it is no coincidence the most successful teams have a habit of scoring late to salvage results.
“If you see the big teams everywhere, it’s not a surprise that they score often in the last part of the game,” he said.
“And then a lot of people will say ‘well, they’re lucky.’ I played for a team in Holland and they called us ‘lucky Ajax’ because we seemed to win a lot games in the last few minutes and they would say we’re lucky.”
“But I think it’s a quality as well. Looking at Manchester United, a lot of those teams.”
“Even Brisbane, if you can see they scored a lot of goals last year and also this year they scored a lot of goals in the last part of the game.”
“It’s also quality, and so it’s a quality for us to make sure we get better, we learn, we take with us that a game is longer than 90 minutes and that we still have to keep on doing our things, work hard and I believe the luck will come toward you.”
Whether self-made or plain old good fortune, Van ‘t Schip will surely be hoping winless Heart’s long overdue slice of luck arrives against Newcastle.
