Besart Berisha charged into Jai Ingham’s arms, his face cracking with emotion and relief, his 100th A-League goal finally plundered.
It had come from Ingham’s pass, neatly delivered back to Berisha after the Kosovo international had horridly air-swung an initial attempt on the ball.
It was a merciful piece of generosity from Ingham and Berisha could hardly forgo a second bite at the one-ton cherry. He embraced Kevin Muscat too, after the swarm of Victory players around him had dissipated.
That's 19 goals this season & 100 overall for @BesartBerisha7, the #ALeague's greatest ever scorer #MVCvCCM @FOXFOOTBALL pic.twitter.com/aDqv4REIjd
— Melbourne Victory (@gomvfc) April 14, 2017
His manager likely had welcome cool, soothing runnels of relief rushing through him as well; his striker had just ended a team-wide goal drought that, a few minutes earlier, had ticked over the six-hour mark.
The Victory saw out their final regular season match, winning 1-0 over the Central Coast Mariners, to break a three-match winless streak.
??? #100 #aleague #goals @gomvfc @BesartBerisha7 #mvcvccm @aamipark #champion showing his emotion with provider #ingham pic.twitter.com/ydcERX4YJ6
— George Salpigtidis (@salheraldsun) April 14, 2017
The manner in which the Victory’s attack has atrophied over the last month has been concerning. The reasons for this process are clear; second place was secured some time ago, first place was out of sight before that, and there has been little to play for.
Little to play for, that is, except momentum. They have watched as Sydney FC have tightened their focus and increased their intensity in these last dead-rubber fixtures.
Victory have done little to emulate it. If the week off before their semi-final dulls their attacking instincts any more, they’ll do well to muster a shot on target. Toothlessness is not a habit any team can afford to let develop.
The Mariners – the team Berisha racked up his triple-figure goal against – allowed the Victory to apply a generous varnish to the complexion of this contest in the final ten minutes. Following Berisha’s goal, the Mariners succumbed, and the Victory could easily have made the scoreline more handsome.
But prior to that point their performance was a little muddled, with the Victory plagued by overplay, indecision and wasteful shooting. It must also be said that Mariners keeper Paul Izzo was excellent.
“It was a decent performance… it wasn’t one of our best,” James Troisi said after the match. “But it’s hard as well; we want to try and go into the finals with flying colours, but, in saying that, we hit that second spot position, so we have to motivate ourselves.”
Pressed further on that issue of motivation, Troisi replied candidly: “I mean, we try not to let it affect us but, in the back of your mind, I think it does a little bit. We’ve got a bit of a rest now [referring to the week off before their finals match] which to be honest isn’t ideal, but that’s how it is.”
And this was after their first win in a month. The blame for any lack of motivation – a puzzling criticism, honestly, to be aimed at a man as voracious as Muscat – must be laid at the manager’s feet.
Muscat has been vocal about performance-over-result lately, and rightly so; the result here was irrelevant to the Victory. And herein lies the catch-22. How does a football manager motivate grown men to exert themselves fully in what was essentially a month of ho-hum finals rehearsals?
One cannot easily divorce the importance of the result from the motivation to play well, and if there is none of the former, it stands to reason there will be little of the latter.
Tony Pulis teams, in the English Premier League, experience a marked drop-off after reaching the 40-point mark – the total at which insulation from relegation is almost assured. Pulis has won just five of 36 fixtures after having reached the 40-point mark in a season, across his career.
Pulis’ job, though, is to avoid relegation; 40 points gained means his job is done. Muscat’s, at this point, is to reach and succeed in the finals; his job, clearly, is far from over.
“There’s a bit of work to do,” Muscat said after the match. “You run the risk if you just leave things for the big occasion; who’s to say things are going to fall your way?”
Muscat then, in slightly contradictory fashion, went on to assert how the home match atmosphere in a semi-final would lift the team to a higher gear, apparently content to run his aforementioned risk.
He is partly right, however. The Victory support will be better in a semi-final against, say, Melbourne City, than they were in a end-of-season obligation against the Mariners. Those that were there, however, were given the pleasure of seeing the competition’s greatest goalscorer reach another milestone. The nervous nineties are over for Berisha, and he may enter the finals with his shoulders relieved of some vague weight, less air-swingy and more predatory.
This win, now that the regular season is over, seems important. It is, at the very least, a tiny bit of momentum gained, a nudge that, in a few weeks, may have grown into a rolling force. The Victory’s squad is so impressive, and is criminally belied by these last four mediocre fixtures.
Marco Rojas was very quiet in this match, and was substituted as he normally is; his presence as one of the Victory’s main creative threats is vital, it goes without saying. The hustle and bustle of Troisi, with his streaky long-range shooting, can be a little haphazard, and it needs to be paired with the delightful elusive spritz we all know Rojas can provide. And, of course, Berisha will need to be more efficient with his chances.
Finally, the regular season is drawing to a close. The finals, where the league’s best six enter, thrash around, and a lone break-neck champion emerges, are already raising the pulse. The fans are twitching, the broadcasters are salivating, and the teams are readying themselves for knockout football.
One hopes, with Berisha’s century of goals putting a spring in their step, that the Victory’s enfeebled attack can bounce back in time.
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