No one could begrudge the outpouring of joy from the Hougang United players and staff after the final whistle against Geylang International on Tuesday night.
After four draws and six defeats from their first 10 games of the 2015 Great Eastern Yeo's S.League season, the Cheetahs finally ended their wretched win-less streak with a much-needed 1-0 victory.
Francisco Salvador Ela was the hero with his third goal of the campaign midway through the second period, although it never quite looked like a Hougang win was on the cards.
The visitors, who came into this off the back of seven points from their last three matches, dominated but struggled to carve apart a resolute back-line.
They were reduced to efforts from long range as Hafiz Nor and Bruno Castanheira each sent two attempts wide, with Nor Azli Yusoff doing likewise.
The Eagles also hit the woodwork twice, first through Tatsuro Inui's free kick from the edge of the box on 15 minutes and then a 22-yard dipping strike from Castanheira on the half-hour mark.
But Ela, who had been largely anonymous upfront, suddenly sprung to life as half-time approached.
First, the Equatoguinean striker broke clear and hit a 20-yard effort that was smothered by Yazid Yasin on 34 minutes.
Two minutes later, he displayed remarkable pace to skin Kento Fukuda on the right before lashing a low drive wide of the near post. Within 60 seconds, he then crashed a 25-yarder over after a powerful run.
Salim Moin's charges took that momentum into the break and re-emerged with it, only to be denied the opening goal by two moments of defensive brilliance.
A quick one-two between Muhaymin Salim and Fairoz Hasan on 47 minutes left the former with a simple tap-in, but Fukuda produced a vital intervention to foil him.
Six minutes later, Nurhilmi Jasni was left clutching his head in disbelief as Yazid somehow tipped his effort over the bar from point-blank range.
Geylang hit back through Inui, who first curled another set-piece from the edge of the box narrowly over before forcing a good save from Ahmadulhaq Che Omar with a rasping 25-yard curler.
But the hosts were rewarded for their enterprise when they plunged the dagger into Geylang on 72 minutes.
Off a swift counter-attack, Muhaymin showed great guile to outpace Fukuda down the right before picking out Ela in the box. With all the time in the world to pick his spot, the 35-year-old calmly planted his finish into the bottom left corner from 10 yards.
The Hougang bench leapt for joy and then nervously watched on as those on the pitch held off Geylang through four agonising minutes of stoppage time to secure a long-awaited victory.
Salim hailed the efforts of his players, some of whom had slumped to the ground after the final whistle after giving their all.
"Today, my players were awesome and they worked very hard," said the former national player, who added that he had simply told them to stay positive despite a 4-0 loss to Home United in their last game.
"I made some changes and in the second half they came back very strongly in that game. I told them to always keep on believing and work hard [for the first win]."
His counterpart Jorg Steinebrunner did not mince his words after the game, describing Hougang as a "negative" side.
"We were the better team, full stop," he asserted. "The boys know I am disappointed; it was a bad performance [in the second half]. We wanted to force things and we [needlessly] gave away the ball; it was a cheap goal [to concede].
"Today, it was definitely the feeling that we wasted at least one point, which would have put us in an even better [league] position."
Hougang United: Ahmadulhaq Che Omar (GK), Faizal Amir (Ruzaini Zainal 79'), Tengku Mushadad, Renshi Yamaguchi, Lau Meng Meng, Nurhilmi Jasni (C), Fairoz Hasan, Shunsuke Nakatake, Fareez Farhan (Manato Takahashi 62'), Muhaymin Salim, Francisco Salvador Ela (Goh Swee Swee 84')
Geylang International: Yazid Yasin (GK), Yuki Ichikawa, Hafiz Osman, Kento Fukuda, Syed Thaha (Anaz Hadee 63'), Nor Azli Yusoff (Mustaqim Manzur 81'), Shah Hirul (Shawal Anuar 76'), Tatsuro Inui, Jozef Kaplan (C), Hafiz Nor, Bruno Castanheira