So Carlisle United are going to finish tenth in League Two. That’s a good platform to build on for next season.

You could see from the win at Orient last Saturday that the players haven’t lain down. They’re taking it to the end of the season.

It would be nice to go out on a high with a home win against Walsall tomorrow. Then the talk will turn to which players we’ll sign. That’s what sells season tickets, presuming fans will be allowed back in which – thankfully – is looking increasingly likely.

The club have announced a profit of more than £750,000 for 2019/20. But the debt has increased to more than £3m, including more than £2m to EWM. That’s still there in the background. Debt is a concern for the whole division, especially in the light of Covid. Even if you don’t get big crowds, what you’ve lost over 20-odd home games adds up.

Football’s all about budgets these days. Carlisle have always tried to keep their house in order but that’s even more important now.

The Walsall game is on May 8: a date that will always be remembered in Cumbria as the anniversary of Jimmy Glass’s goal. I was there with a couple of my mates in the middle of the main stand. We were fearing the worst. You could feel the tension, and you could sense what was going to happen if we were relegated out of the Football League. It was a bit frightening, to be honest.

It was the Michael Knighton era, of course. Around the directors’ box people were trying to rip seats out. It would have been mayhem. And from that, suddenly it all changed in a second. From expecting the worst, it was a celebration.

Even though I played over 500 games, it was still emotional to me. I did celebrate that night! It shows you what can happen in football, even in the last second. You see a lot of keepers coming up for corners now, but how often have you seen one do that, especially with so much at stake? We did go out of the league a few years later but I don’t think we’d have got straight back in, if ever, if we’d gone down that day.

Talk of angry fans brings us to the protests around Old Trafford last Sunday. Everybody can see where they’re coming from, with the way the game could have been taken away by the European Super League. The real diehard fans will peacefully get their point over.

I don’t know if it was an organised mob that caused the havoc, with police getting hurt. But I think it spoiled the point the real fans were making. I’m all for the fans having a voice. But idiots causing mayhem is way out of order.

Fans will be happier across Manchester, with City reaching the Champions League final for the first time. Pep Guardiola has got to be the best manager in the world. And Thomas Tuchel has done a fine job at Chelsea. It will be great to have an all-English final between the two sides on May 29.