Melbourne Heart have avoided the ignominy of setting a record 20-game winless run in the A-League by beating Newcastle Jets 3-1 at the AAMI Park stadium, yesterday.

The hosts trailed to Taylor Regan’s opener and looked set to surpass the sorry streak of 19 matches without tasting victory which they share with the now-defunct New Zealand Knights.

But goals from Iain Ramsay and Mate Dugandzic in the shadows of half-time, followed by a second from Dugandzic, the former Melbourne Victory man, midway through the second half, sealed a long-awaited triumph for the club.

Melbourne Heart sacked John Aloisi and replaced him with former coach John van’t Schip earlier this month in a bid to end the nightmare sequence of results.

Michael Mifsud started on the bench but replaced David Williams on 32 minutes.

The Malta striker went agonisingly close to make it 4-1, narrowly failing to connect with Harry Kewell’s tempting pass across the face of goal during a sustained period of pressure from the home team.

In the end, the two-goal buffer proved sufficient for the drought to be broken, promp-ting wild celebrations among the 5,046 crowd – and relieved restraint among players and staff – as the Heart look forward to next week’s away game against Adelaide with renewed optimism.

Melbourne Heart are still languishing at the bottom place of the standings on eight points from 15 matches, six behind ninth-placed Welling-ton Phoenix who play Mel-bourne Victory today.