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How Heart can differentiate themselves from the Victory

5th April, 2010
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Expert
5th April, 2010
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John Aloisi - Melbourne Heart. Slattery Images.

What a week it was for the A-League’s newest franchise, the Melbourne Heart, with the signing of former Sydney FC pair John Aloisi and Simon Colosimo, revealing their strip and announcing their training and administrative base.

And the manner in which they made those announcements was encouraging, also.

They resisted the temptation to make those announcements all at once, instead announcing them over consecutive days, making sure they forced themselves into the press over an extended period. (They could even have gone one step further by releasing their home strip in a separate launch as opposed to revealing it at the same time as they announced Aloisi’s arrival).

But clouding all the announcements and developments are still the doubts about how the Heart can differentiate themselves from the Melbourne Victory, particularly with no geographical, ethnic or cultural differences to tempt Victory supporters over to the new club and entice new fans to the game.

(The most common reason I have heard from Victory fans considering switching allegiance to Heart is a perceived arrogance from Ernie Merrick, which is hardly a worrying sign for the Victory).

The consensus among pundits is that the Heart will have to be aggressive in all facets of building a club.

They must, we are constantly told, build and develop an aggressive rivalry with the Victory (Aloisi did well to get the ball rolling at his announcement), be aggressive in social media platforms, be active in local communities, be aggressive in public relations to get the club into the press regularly, etc.

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But this should be a basic requirement for any new club, let alone one facing the model A-League club in terms of membership, supporter base and on-field success.

The Heart needs more than just the basics to succeed.

One tactic it has discussed openly and could be key to building a supporter base is attracting former NSL club fans that were left disenfranchised by the creation of the A-League and the Victory.

Whether they can do so remains to be seen. Just because it has been five years since the A-League began doesn’t mean a gaggle of former NSL fans are going to be enticed back by the Heart.

But the Heart need to try and build a fanbase somehow, and working within the communities of these former NSL teams should be a priority, particularly if there is a large ambivalence to the Victory.

While Mark Viduka still refuses to rule out a playing return in the A-League, he is likely to have some coaching role at the Heart, in addition to being number one season ticket holder with the Melbourne Knights .

The Heart should exploit this connection, building some sort of link with the Knights to entice their community base to jump on the Heart bandwagon.

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Having Josip Skoko, the Heart’s all but confirmed marquee signing, will also help in this regard.

While the Victory’s supporter base is pulled from all ethnic backgrounds, the Heart shouldn’t be afraid to go after specific ethnic groups and winning over former NSL supporters needs to be a priority.

They need points of difference, and they need to exploit Victory’s weaknesses, which, in reality, is only its inability at inception to entice NSL fans en masse to the A-League.

That first game against the Victory will be crucial (the most important in the A-League’s history?) to start building the rivalry. Every controversial moment will be the first building blocks of the rivalry.

If the FFA has any scheduling smarts (they didn’t show much of it this season), they will start the new season at Melbourne’s new rectangular stadium with the first Melbourne derby; the first in the A-League’s history.

Doing everything they can to build the Melbourne rivalry is imperative for the Heart’s sustainability.

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