The equation is simple, now the 40-minute frenzy is over. We just have to trust that this flurry of Carlisle United transfer activity has been better than the last one.

That will require the holding of breath, the suspending of disbelief and, to a point, wiping from the memory the misadventures of last summer.

Make no mistake: the hectic behaviour of Monday night was a last-ditch and sadly necessary attempt to correct some badly flawed recruitment in the supposedly calmer waters of the close-season.

In attack, which has been an historically bad area for the Blues in 2021/22, a red pen has now been directed through every name the club brought in during last year's warmer months.

Tristan Abrahams: dispatched to Grimsby. Zach Clough: given a free. Manasse Mampala: off to Weymouth. Brad Young: returned to sender (Aston Villa).

No signing offers a guarantee. Responsibility for each can no doubt be debated. Whichever angle you take, though, that was a collective failure which contributed heavily to the position United are now in, and made the belated shopping we saw on January's transfer deadline day essential.

You know something’s gone awry when you’re having to unwrap one new attacking player after another in a four-man procession in the final hour of an winter window. You know a few more recent Plan As have had to be shelved along the way, too.

You know leaps of faith are very much being taken. Making a bevy of new signings gives an adrenaline hit – and shows certain resources were indeed there all along – but now the tricky part starts.

It depends, for one thing, on United managing to accommodate so many new players and make a coherent whole out of them.

First thing there: the thought of noses feeling out of joint can be summarily ignored. Nobody who’s led United’s line this season has any right to feel unsettled by the arrival of fresh players, whatever their pedigree.

A side capable of 19 goals in 27 league games can, it’s safe to say, leave all egos on the shelf. There is every realistic reason to expect Kristian Dennis, and Tobi Sho-Silva, and Owen Windsor, to be as good, minimum, and realistically, better. The bar is not high.

Jamie Devitt was the fifth through the door on Monday (Birmingham defender Mitchell Roberts was the first, so early in the day he feels like a long-serving player now), and his arrival feels like a last wild-card played both to cheer the heart and hopefully offer the team just a bit of the creativity they've been without.

In Devitt’s case, it boils down to fitness, and the ability to regain something that recent years, and injuries, have hindered. The midfielder has not had a true flow of games to match those he enjoyed when last at Carlisle, back in 2019.

It seems ambitious to assume he can slot straight back into that old groove. United have hitched their post-January fortunes to a proven performer with injury baggage before (Mark Cullen). The best we can hope, with Devitt, is that a good player and positive character – and he is unquestionably both – gets a fair and fortunate run.

Expecting more would be foolish. Yet even a fraction of Devitt's past influence would lift this sterile side. Even a few of his telling set-pieces would offer improvement on what we’ve been watching recently.

As for the others, Dennis seems the closest fit in terms of what this United most needed: someone with penalty box experience to get on the end of the energetic things they sometimes create but seldom finish.

Dennis has a good scoring record from his times at Macclesfield, Chesterfield and Notts County. If he can offer a focal point, the likes of Omari Patrick and Jordan Gibson should be cheered. Carlisle have sorely lacked a marksman to maximise their work around and outside the box. Again – it won’t take much to improve the Blues' capabilities in this regard.

The others – Sho-Silva and Windsor – appear at first glance squad men who Carlisle hope will hit their straps. Sho-Silva offers stature rather than an eyecatching goals CV.

Again: Carlisle have needed that. His job will be to add a degree of muscle in the many games at this level when it’s needed, and also show why a striker down the pecking order at Sutton United can be the answer at Carlisle United.

Windsor is another Under-23 punt – who from that bloated level is not? – but Keith Millen likes the West Brom tyro's hunger and aggression. His remit must be to look more battle-ready than, for instance, Young and Mampala, and perhaps also to help provoke something more out of Tyrese Omotoye.

All these pluses have to be sought over just 19 League Two fixtures of varying tension and demand. Millen declared himself “surprised” Carlisle got so many deals done in the end, and today has to sift through all these new goodies and make something workable.

He is not the only manager in the survival fight with that sort of task on his hands. All the other relegation battlers signed players late in the window, although none with United’s 11th-hour volume and haste.

What we have seen here is not so much strategic teambuilding but an urgent fresh start with the best available materials in a very short space of time. Millen’s gradual improvement of United has hit a certain ceiling in the last two games; how much of the recent work does he now retain, and how much will he alter straight away?

Frankly, this revamp only needs to come off to the extent that Carlisle, currently eight points clear of trouble, are still a Football League club by May. Imagining them capable of higher things this season is for the fairies.

In a perfect world, Dennis will get eight or nine goals, Sho-Silva will scatter some nervous defences, Windsor and Roberts will look the part, Devitt will be repaired to crowd-pleasing effect and the overall freshness will give everyone inside and outside Brunton Park a lift.

It's unlikely, though, to be so smooth. This fight remains long and uncertain. At least the Blues have some new solutions to throw at a problem of their own inadequate making. Let us pray enough of them work.