Carlisle United 2 Scunthorpe United 2: Carlisle are unbeaten at Brunton Park since March. What are you so worried about?

That intro came to you from the spin department. Now the reality: this was a grim, often troubling watch that, the late fightback aside, offered little encouragement about the immediate or middle-distance future.

The 95th minute salvaging of a point was, in one sense, appropriate punishment for a visiting side who were keen to waste time from approximately 2.59pm onwards.

It was also, it must be said, flattering to a Carlisle side that started haphazardly, continued disjointedly and ended, if on the front foot, still with a fair dollop of desperation.

United were applauded off on account of Brennan Dickenson leaving the equaliser until almost the final touch. That response, understandable in the dramatic circumstances, was also extremely kind given the spectacle that had preceded it.

It was, for a large part of proceedings, a game from the dark corners of Blues history: when they come up against a struggling side and oblige them into a shocking lead.

Thanks to Jordan Gibson and Dickenson they avoided defeat. There will, though, be plenty who feel that a fig leaf; United, certainly, cannot go about exposing their modesty as blatantly as this. The broader fear is that this is as good as Carlisle are, both in planning and execution, and we are going to have to endure more of this over a gruelling season.

One thing is clear: if the Blues keep starting games in this way, their hopes of any sort of credible campaign will be toast. The opening 45 minutes were incoherent, impotent and garnished by one scrappy goal against and another that was dreadful to watch.

Just now, corners are like kryptonite to Chris Beech’s defence. Aaron Jarvis eventually headed in the first after a Magnus Norman save; Scunthorpe having kept the ball alive from a third-minute set-piece that brought no sense of Carlisle control at any of its various stages.

United from there were panicked, unsettled by the Iron’s pressing, failing to connect anything up the pitch and almost gifted Neil Cox’s team a couple more. When Gibson made breaks down the right – the only real source of positivity in this period – there was little at the end.

Tristan Abrahams was a forlorn, remote figure up front; Zach Clough, yet to find his tactical place, vanished in the margins. Carlisle looked like strangers rather than a cohesive whole. And then they somehow failed to spot the tall figure of Manny Onariase strolling onto another corner.

The boos that greeted half-time were predictable; what followed was an agonising toil in different ways. Beech had hooked Joe Riley before the break, sacrificing him for Dickenson, and it should be said that the sub added a degree of height and heft to what United were trying to do.

It still came, though, painstakingly, Carlisle taking until the 70th minute to have any sort of serious shot in the half but the last 20 at least bringing them closer: Rod McDonald heading just wide, Dickenson unloading a couple, the sub and Jon Mellish finally keeping a few Blues aerial forays around Scunthorpe territory, and Gibson drilling them back into it after swooping on some ill-advised visiting defensive play.

This, at last, was the moment you fancied Scunthorpe might buckle, having been unaccustomed to winning away since early spring. Cox’s players dwelt, sat, delayed, did all the things a side will do when trying to cling onto something that’s been alien to them for so long.

And finally, after more fraught salvos, involving McDonald as an emergency target man, Kelvin Mellor pushing on, Corey Whelan doing the lord’s work to cut out Scunthorpe counters and Lewis Alessandra and Brad Young pepping things up from the bench, the Blues got there, when Mellor turned the ball out to Gibson, Carlisle’s best player offered a searching cross and Dickenson’s leap did the rest.

The celebrations from the fans still here (some had given up in the 75th minute) were fervent – and in Beech’s case, by all accounts excessive in the face of the fourth official, earning the head coach a booking from ref Rebecca Welch and some scathing criticism from some of his own fans.

So ended a day which took Brunton Park to the depths of its despair several times and then back again. Looking back from a little distance, it’s still not clear how far on these 95 tortuous minutes have moved us, if at all.