Melbourne Heart coach John van ‘t Schip has lauded the character of his troops after they scored two goals in the dying minutes to record a stunning come-from-behind 2-1 win over Adelaide United at Hindmarsh Stadium on Friday night.
Van ‘t Schip finally claimed victory at the third attempt over his former FC Twente colleague, Reds coach Rini Coolen, in what he described as a difficult away game.
Heart had taken only one point in their last seven starts, but van ‘t Schip said their first win since early November will give them plenty of confidence heading into the New Year.
“I think today the players showed great character,” he said.
“It was a squad effort today and we showed a lot of character and I think that’s the biggest win today, of course there’s the three points.”
“Coming back from 1-0 down in a difficult away game and then going back to
Melbourne with three points should give us a lot of confidence.”
Van ‘t Schip said despite being 1-0 down the Heart believed they were going to salvage something from the match with United struggling to find a second goal to kill off the contest.
The Dutchman admitted luck had also played a part and finally erred in favour of the Heart.
“We got into the game, the confidence was growing,” he said.
“The longer the game goes on, we kept believing in our game, in a good result or at least a draw. The most important thing is the win, the belief.”
“I think it fell our side this game. A lot of the games it went the other side but today it went our side and I think we deserved it as well.”
Veteran Josip Skoko returned from injury and turned in an impressive 30-minute cameo and delivered the corner that led to his skipper Simon Colosimo equalising.
The former Socceroo also thrust the ball back into the danger zone for Jason Hoffman to lay off to John Aloisi with the Adelaide legend nailing the injury-time winner.
“It was important for Josip to get some minutes,” he said.
“He hasn’t played for a few weeks but you can see that when he comes in that he’s a good player. He can open up the game, he has good vision. We know he’s an important player in the midfield.”
Colosimo acknowledged a trying six-week period where the Heart loss six of seven matches despite producing quality football.
The Heart skipper said while the win against United has snapped the losing streak it has also reignited confidence within the group.
“The hardest thing is we’ve been playing quite well,” he said.
“You go into the change rooms thinking’we’re getting the ball forward, we’re keeping possession quite well, we’ve got more possession, we’re having more shots, more crosses and it’s just not falling our way.”
“We’ve believed even in the last four or five weeks that we can win games and we’re doing enough to win games. It’s about that ball bouncing in for us. Now it went in we can believe we can score every time we get the ball in the box.”
