Four years and two months since Carlisle United last topped League Two, the Blues are back at the summit.
The 2-0 victory at Walsall, coupled with postponements and abandonments elsewhere, meant Chris Beech’s team moved into first place.
It was the first time since November 2016, when Keith Curle’s team thrashed Mansfield 5-2, that Carlisle had gone to the top of their division.
Plenty has changed at Brunton Park since then. Here are some of the reasons why United climbed back to the peak.
IDENTITY
That thing we often call for, but find hard to define. Sometimes it’s only obvious when it’s in front of us – and at United just now, it couldn’t be much clearer.
When was the last time a Blues team had such a focused and distinctive playing style: one you know you’re going to be watching, yet one other teams are regularly finding hard to handle?
The best of Curle’s time was that autumn charge of 2016, when United’s grafting, experienced midfield was garnished by the high-grade supply of Nicky Adams and the finishing of Charlie Wyke.
‘Beech Ball’, though, is even more defined. Carlisle build from the back only in the sense that they get the ball forward keenly, often via goalkeeper Paul Farman, and then press the life out of opponents.
Their midfielders are ravenous around second balls. Their attack is an interchangeable mixture of flair and line-leading, both wide and centrally.
United are an urgent rather than a patient side, combative as opposed to delicate, forceful in the generating of chances: always in games as a result, and often on the right side of them.
There is something old-fashioned about the muscularity of Carlisle’s play, but something modern about the energy, fitness and relentlessness behind it.
COHESION
This applies off the field as well as on, and reflects the greater sense of harmony among those whose job it is to build a team and make it tick.
David Holdsworth, the director of football, and Chris Beech, the head coach, appear on the same strategic page when it comes to identifying the qualities that will improve Carlisle’s lot in League Two.
Holdsworth mentioned this recently, in terms of looking at teams who have done well in the division before, and Beech has responded by coaching a side that can handle itself, that is better from set-pieces than in many previous United years, and that doesn’t stroke its chin and wish to be attractive in defensive positions.
Hence, too, Beech’s promotion of Jon Mellish for his size, appetite and running in midfield, as well as the goals the head coach always felt he could provide.
Carlisle’s other midfielders do not have Mellish’s physical stature but are still full-frontal in terms of commitment and industry.
Across the pitch you never see Beech’s United bullied. This, again, is progress, and appears to have been planned.
RECRUITMENT
United have got it right this time and, while the obvious caveat is that the season is not yet halfway through, the fact is Carlisle are deservedly up there after a massive squad overhaul.
The financial imperatives behind this began at the tail-end of the Curle years, when United recognised they could not sustain the bonus culture which almost took them into League One.
The prudence imposed by Edinburgh Woollen Mill and carried out by Holdsworth was a risk in terms of assuring on-pitch success but a few years on Carlisle have shown a more poised touch when it comes to playing their reduced hand in the market.
While Curle went for proven experience, United have gone for youth and appetite: one or two players who have gone under radars at certain places but been backed afresh in Cumbria.
Callum Guy’s acquisition from Blackpool has proved excellent judgement. Joe Riley’s Manchester United background and eagerness to leave injury misfortune behind are increasingly evident.
Omari Patrick is feeling (and reciprocating) love he has never truly experienced before. George Tanner was a young asset well worth investing in.
It is not simply a squad of energetic hopefuls, bearing in mind the experience of such as Lewis Alessandra, Rod McDonald, Rhys Bennett and Farman, but Carlisle’s core is younger, cheaper and, critically, of the right ambition and character.
It wouldn’t be fair to say squads of recent years have been chock-full of bad eggs. But certain egos have been detrimental at times, and you don’t see that with this bunch. When constructing a team on less, this is surely an essential aspect.
PATHWAY
The biggest difference between the squad Curle took to the top and the one Beech is leading is in the home-grown department.
Curle required old heads to define his rebuild of United. This new version has shortened the road from academy to first-team.
This was, again, a step down the path of prudence. The involvement of EWM and Holdsworth came with an insistence that Carlisle would put renewed accent on the promotion of youth.
Hence the deliberate speed applied to the professional deals awarded to such as Liam McCarron, Jarrad Branthwaite, Taylor Charters and Lewis Bell.
Maximising McCarron and Branthwaite’s status paid off when bigger clubs started showing interest. The deal secured for Branthwaite from Everton has sustained Carlisle through much of the Covid-19 pandemic so far.
Bell, 17, is now on the fringes of Beech’s team. Charters made an impressive full league debut on Saturday. Josh Dixon, back from two tough injury years, is tapping at the door. Youth striker Sam Fishburn has twice been on the bench of late.
Beech had a background of acting this way with young players at previous clubs and again this fit United’s new principles when it was time to move on from the futile reign of Steven Pressley.
It should stand them in further good stead, while other young players at Brunton Park must also look on and think they have a chance.
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