Melbourne Heart may have come into the A-League with a host of big-name players, but it has been a relative unknown from the Victorian Premier League who has proven the club's most impressive signing in the first five weeks of the season.
When names such as Aloisi, Sibon, Colosimo, Heffernan and Beauchamp were being spoken about pre-season, Nick Kalmar was working his hardest just to prove he was worth the risk for coach John van 't Schip.
He arrived at the club with an injury and felt he was facing a race against time to get his name anywhere near the team sheet for the beginning of the Melbourne Heart journey.
Five weeks later and Kalmar is now down in history as the first Heart player to score a winner for his club. His 11th-minute header in Saturday's 1-0 win against North Queensland, combined with a cracking strike against Perth last weekend has transformed him from A-League wannabe to one of the league's emerging stars.
For the 22-year-old, the journey has been somewhat surreal.
"I've been pinching myself ever since I came to the club. I'm very humbled to be among the players we have here. We have a good coaching staff and a good playing group and you go to every training session and the professionalism at training really helps," he said after his heroics on Saturday.
"I learn a lot at every training session and I've got a lot of improvement and a lot to work on, but I think the set-up here is very good and I'm enjoying it."
Van 't Schip, who boasts a wealth of international connections, admitted the decision to take a risk on an injured player from a state league who had already been overlooked by other A-League teams wasn't taken lightly.
"To be honest, you never know how players will fit in. Nick has fitted in quite quickly. He had an injury when he arrived in pre-season, so he missed the first three weeks," he said.
"But he's very important to us already. He showed that today as well. After this week, where he had hardly any training, he performed well for 90 minutes. He did very well. He worked very hard and made a good goal again. I'm very happy to have him with the squad."
The legacy of that hamstring still remains for Kalmar, who despite his heroics over the past fortnight, feels as though he still has a substantial amount of improvement to come.
"I didn't have a full pre-season. I didn’t get the kilometres in my legs like I would have liked to but I think I still have a lot of improvement to play for 90 minutes consistently. My performances are sometimes patchy, I'm in and out of the game, I think that will get better as I get fitter," Kalmar said.
That's something his coach agrees with, not only for Kalmar but for the entire team. Van 't Schip is concerned by the lack of consistency from his side over the 90 minutes, but also knows that with every game his key players, such as Gerald Sibon, Alex Terra and Kalmar are getting fitter.
As he bids to improve his fitness, Kalmar can also rely on confidence, both his own after two goals in as many weeks and the belief his coach has shown in him.
"The coach has a lot of faith in me and tells me to go out and that I have nothing to lose. I just want to play to my ability. Every game I go out with that attitude and it's helped me a lot," he said.