My first day as a Hearts player was very stressful but also exciting. It was the summer of 2009 and first I signed an amateur contract for one year at Heart of Midlothian FC. Although I was only 17, I should train with the U19s. The emphasis is actually on train. I was only allowed to train and could not sign a professional contract like all the other guys of the U19s because I was a Ukrainian citizen. Therefore it wasn’t allowed for me to play in official matches and to have a job. Only when I reached the age of 18, I could finally accept the German citizenship. I was born in Germany and felt like a German. Hearts knew it, so that’s why they “accepted” the six-month waiting period. So I did the only thing I was allowed by law: train and train with full commitment.
Dont dream of winning, Train for it.
It was not so easy for me to go to Scotland for a longer period of time because of my passport situation, so a student visa was necessary. That’s why I applied at Stevenson College Edinburgh and was accepted. Although this was more out of necessity, I took my studies very serious and even found great pleasure in studying, much to the delight of my Mom.
But back to the day of my arrival; I landed on the 17th of June 2009 in Edinburgh and I was picked up by a very sympathetic – bizarre man who was very chatty and had a lot of stuff to tell. (Allen Carswell; who turned out to be a great person). Unfortunately I didn’t understand a word he was saying. I assumed that he must be a foreigner who spoke with a strong accent; because my English knowledge wasn’t that bad and usually I could understand everything. Only a few days later I realized that this man was not a foreigner, on the contrary, he was a Scot and spoke fluent Scottish.
In the Hearts Academy I was welcomed warmly. Of course many of the players still remembered me as I was there on a trial just a couple months ago. Immediately I saw Darren Murray (U19 coach) who has made a great impact to my professional career, and Anataloy Korobochka. I was very happy to see them again. They took me to the nearby student accommodation of the Heriot Watt University, where I had to stay for the next two weeks until a host family is found for me. There I was, standing in my room, alone in a foreign country. Of course I was scared and wondered if it was really the right step. It wasn’t really like a panic feeling, but more like a frightening one.
Fear of change is the enemy of success.
The first two weeks were quite nice and went over fast. It was the time of preseason, so everything I got to see of Edinburgh was the Hearts Academy and my small student’s room. After two weeks, I was introduced to my host parents. I was very excited to see my new host Parents: the couple John and Suzan Gibson. A lovely family. The house was quite small and I got a comfy room in the attic. John and Suzan were paid 560 pounds every month of Hearts, to provide me a place to sleep and 3 meals per day. They done a great job and made everything a little easier for me.
A couple days past by and suddenly Anatoly Korobochka was standing in front of the door and wanted to talk to me. He informed me that he will leave Hearts FC and that I will be on my own from now on. Of course it was a shock for me, Anatloy has been the initiator of my move to Scotland and remained an important person of trust to me. There were a couple of things he didn’t planned to take back to Russia with him and gave them to me. Among the things was a Laptop. I didn’t had a computer or Laptop with me in Scotland so finally I was able to speak to my family on a daily basis. Slowly I began to settle. There was a lot of work to do.
I was 1.76m, quite large but very skinny, just like 54kg. With this kind of physique, no one would be able to survive in the Scottish Football League. Therefore I decided to work on it and train my body much more. I was driven by the following thought: “Denis, you only have a contract for one year, 6 months of this year you are NOT allowed to play; so you have to make perfect use of the 6 months and push yourself to the limit, so that you are perfectly prepared for the following “last” 6 months.“ I wanted to have a professional contract with the 1 team and I would do everything for it.
You already have the answer: You know who you are and what you want.
Fail to prepare, prepare to fail. (A quote Darren Murray used to use)
Thinking about this I still can remember the words of the former sports administrator Konstantin Kornakov ( who also had a big impact to my career and remains a good friend of me and my family) like it was yesterday . I told him that I will do everything possible and work like no other with the aim of signing a 1st team contract and become a squad member of the 1st team. His reply was dry and cold: “Denis, to sign a 1st team contract and to become part of the 1st team squad, is comparable for you like walking to the moon”. This sentence would become one of the most important sentences of my future and I am extremely grateful for these words of Konstantin; because it inspired me. The following quote sums it up perfectly:
“I don’t like compliments. I prefer criticism… then I can prove them wrong”.
It was the start of August, the semester holidays were over and it was time to attend a few lectures at college. They gave a curriculum and I realized I had to be present at College and my Lectures not less than 21 hours per week (because of my Student Visa).Of course that was another big obstacle for me, but there was nothing to do about it. I wasn’t allowed to play games for Hearts FC and now I couldn’t even participate in the training, because my study plan and the Hearts training sessions were at the same time. Hearts trained in the morning from 8am to 2pm and the lectures were held at the same time. But even that could bring me down or lower my spirit. I thought: Challenge accepted.
My lectures started at 9am in the morning and finished at 2pm. Every single day (after I finished College) I immediately ran to bus-stop to catch the bus number 34 to Riccarton (to the Hearts Academy). Of course, all the players were already on their way home and the Academy was empty. Only the Kitman Goggzy was still there finishing his work for the day. He knew the process very well. Every day, exactly at 3pm Denis Prychynenko will arrive and asks for his training gear. I had designed my training plan myself: from 3:30pm to 5:30pm I trained alone with the ball in our Astro Ground. The First 20 minutes I was keeping the ball up against the wall, then 20 minutes shooting/passing the ball against the wall, so I could work on my first touch and my passing of course. Afterwards I would dribble with the ball through a square of cones I prepared myself for another 20 minutes. The last hour I would spend with finishing and free-kicks. And the end of my sessions indoor would always finish with a number of 15 second runs combined with short sprints.
At 5:30pm I was obviously soaking wet and had to change my training clothes. Goggzy knew that and always left some spare kit outside his washing room before he left home. Only then did my strength training in the gym begin. I went to the gym and worked on my Fitness-Plan (basically just muscle-building) which I have received from our fitness coach Neil Gibson. As I went through the fitness plan not once but three times, my daily training ended only towards 8pm. After showering and taking the bus I finally arrived home about 9pm.
„I find that the harder I work, the more luck I seem to have“. Week people believe in luck. Strong People– cause and effect.
Then the relaxing part of my day could start: call my parents; drink 2l of milk and sleep. So 2 months have passed and I could already see big progress on my body and my football ability’s. On my college day-offs I obviously joined the team training of the u19s and sometimes also on weekends, if there were friendly games or training sessions. So my Coach Darren and my teammates could see and keep track of my increasing improvements. I started to invest every free minute of the day on my fitness. So my training program continued even when I was at home and I added press ups and sit ups to it. Even for me it sounds now unbelievable, but I actually done over 800 press-ups and 500 sit-ups spread over the night.
One day I was late from College and only managed to arrive at 5pm at the Hearts Academy, but I wasn’t willing to cut my daily program and just done my normal work. Simple mathematics shows that it was already 9pm when I was ready with my program. Instead of getting ready and taking a shower I decided to go back to the Astro and do some more “keepie-uppies”, a habit from my childhood. Eventually, I got tired and fall asleep in the middle of the hall.
Work so hard that one day your signature will be called an autograph.
On the next morning Darren stormed nervous into the Astro; saw me and shouted: „Denis, son, there you are! John and Suzan have been really worried about you because you didn’t came home last night.” I explained to him quietly, still a little sleepy that I fell asleep here yesterday. Only at that moment he found out about my daily training. He knew about my gym-program, but he had no idea about my five-to six-hour individual training program. He was very excited about my work rate and it spread throughout the Club. Soon I got the reputation as the hardest -working Hearts player and this was the reason I got the “Nicholson Award”. The story about: how I fell asleep in the indoor Astro became legendary and I’m sure that there are still some rumours about it.
6 months have passed and I have earned more and more respect from my teammates and the coaching staff of Hearts. Everyone knew how hard I was working and I think it astonished them a bit. Within the first 6 months I had gained both, height (1.80 m) and muscle mass (70 kg). There were regular Skin tests, Sprint and endurance tests and my results were astounding. My daily training started to show big effects. The results showed that I had gained 16 kg just in muscle mass. My Sprint results improved significantly and in the Jojo test I was always right up there.
The boys of the U17 and U19 heard about my increasing results because of my hours and hours inside the astro/gym. The consequence was that every day there were more and more boys staying behind and doing some extra work. Even when I arrived late from College there still were boys inside the astro doing extra work. So I guess that Darren and I were the initiators of “extra work” at Hearts.
Work until you no longer have to introduce yourself.
Finally the 6 months passed and I became the German passport and was allowed to play for Hearts FC. My Coach Darren was really thankful about the new spirit I brought to the team and the young boys so he gave me a chance for the u19s and I used it very well. I finished the season as a starting 11 player and also finished my College Course with over 90%.
The following season was an absolute dream season for me. Darren gave me all of his trust and I was appointed vice captain of the U19s and I was offered my FIRST professional contract. I signed the contract and this was the start of an amazing year. Furthermore I applied at Napier University for Business with Marketing and was accepted. Because I basically just choose online or part-time modules at Napier University I was able to attend every training session of Hearts and could do my studies in my free time. We finished 2nd place in the League behind Celtic. My work rate and extra training has paid off and I was awarded U19s player of the year. As mentioned before I also “won” the “Nicholson Award” for my attitude and the influence I made on the other boys, especially the young boys. Even some of the Hearts fans heard about my work-rate and I got some attention of them: even though I didn’t even trained or played with the 1st team, but the u19s.
The door to professional Football was finally open. When I recall and think back to the “hard times”- a time in which I used every free minute to work on myself, to reach my goal- I feel happiness. Because this is what it’s all about and this is all what counts: The journey is what brings us happiness not the destination.
Of course it was not always easy and there were days when I cried and wondered why I am doing all this? Of course, I got the feeling of despair in the first couple of months; I came to Scotland to fulfil my dream, but wasn’t allowed to play games and couldn’t even train with the rest of the team. There were days when I just wanted to go back home to Germany, back to the familiar circle of my family and friends. Sometimes I even had the desire to live a normal way of life, without all this stress and the hard training.
But I loved the game of football too much and wanted to do everything from the given opportunities so I could watch into the mirror every night and tell the person inside the mirror: “Bravo Denis, Today you’ve done everything possible to get closer to your dream “.
A warrior does not give up what he loves; he finds the love in what he does.
I had a goal in my mind and I wanted to do everything possible to make it become a reality. There were still countless tasks in front of me, but I accepted the challenge. I am willing to work every day for my dream and make the best out of my possibilities, so one day I will be at the very top and that is nothing less than playing and compete against the best teams and players in the world.
An eagle was sitting on a tree, relaxing and doing nothing. A small rabbit saw the eagle and asked: “Can I also sit, like you, relaxing and doing nothing?” –“Of course you can, why not.” -said the eagle. So the rabbit sat down underneath the tree and started to relax. Suddenly a fox came by, caught the rabbit and ate it. Moral of this story: “If you want to relax and to do nothing, you have to be very, very high.”
denisprychynenko 