Carlisle United 2 Northampton Town 1: Somehow, you just knew. Even as time froze and a loud and fervid Brunton Park held its breath, even as Jordan Gibson put his hands on his hips and looked, and waited…you knew.
This Carlisle, this astonishingly transformed team, this manager who must feel he could walk across a lake right now, have replaced doubt with certainty, brittleness with character, desperation with hope.
What other outcome was remotely possible, then, when Gibson stepped up? In went the shot, firmly to Liam Roberts’ right. The Blues had won again, seconds before the credits were due to roll.
The old place rattled and shook. People hoisted themselves onto other people in the Paddock, craning themselves above the perimeter wall, standing on the dugouts. There was excoriating noise, hearts thumped. Carlisle United 2 Northampton Town 1.
Bloody hell. And yet also: are you surprised? At first, maybe. But not now, four wins into this Paul Simpson resurrection which is unfolding – no exaggeration – into one of the best stories in this football club’s history.
The man in the dugout, a preacher of calm and reason, may want to skip this bit, but as Carlisle’s stadium struggled to contain a quite remarkable set of feelings late on Saturday afternoon, the thought of what this means danced in the mind.
The plot line is one for the scriptwriters, the novelists. A local hero leaves on a tail of glory, spends the next 15 years experiencing many of football’s elusive highs and testing lows, is then asked to confront cancer, and a few months later comes back home and does this?
We are, let's be clear, experiencing rare times here at Brunton Park. These words will look mighty daft if Carlisle somehow fail to see this job through, but just now, who is arguing against the force of this Simpson-led team, this revival of something which felt, only three weeks ago, to be on some level heading towards a little death?
From such a desperate starting point, the difference is astounding. From conceding goals in abundance and taking one point from six matches, the players are now defending like tigers.
They have match-spinning substitutes, character to grind through games as awkward as this one was always going to be. They go to the end, making their own luck in the most dramatic ways imaginable.
Things like the last two 94th-minute finales are not accidents of fate. They are direct rewards from the aura and football expertise Simpson has brought back, aligned with a spiritedness among the players that many thought was dangerously absent.
Yes, Carlisle are now…a good team, since what happened on Saturday is what good teams do. Once again: 11 games can still challenge this. The first bump in the road cannot be far away. But the idea of it derailing things completely at this point feels warmly unlikely.
When has the club achieved this degree of mood-change before in such a short timeframe? From the desolation of Swindon came this sunny day: the biggest crowd of the season, beachballs and flags, and a team going up against League Two’s second best and staying right in it, even through the seriously awkward parts.
After an early chance for Kristian Dennis, which visiting goalkeeper Roberts met with a superb save, the first 45 were genuinely and predictable troublesome. Northampton attacked hungrily, with width and the willing line-leading of Louis Appere.
Steadily, Carlisle’s early gusto faded. The ball seldom stuck against the Cobblers’ big defenders, and Jon Brady’s side started to find opportunities between the lines. Paul Lewis and Sam Hoskins almost profited, while Dynel Simeu and Morgan Feeney had to do the Lord’s work to clear crosses and block shots.
Appere and Hoskins missed the visitors’ best chances, and Carlisle survived, with quite some edginess, some late corners from the division’s set-piece experts. They reached the interval grateful, but competitively alive. Something else crushingly unlikely a few weeks ago.
Simpson made a tweak, moving Jon Mellish forward to shut down midfield space. It did not overhaul the entire direction of things, but United did temper Northampton’s advances.
The occasion remained taut and tense, clearly something that was too much for a pair of young bozos who invaded the pitch, gesturing to the travelling fans and barely touched by a steward until they’d returned to the Warwick Road End.
Then: showtime. Simpson replaced Jamie Devitt with Brennan Dickenson, and United began pressing with a little more muscle. The substitute rasped a shot from distance that tested Roberts. Gibson started finding more opportunities on the break. Simeu and Feeney kept tackling and blocking with unending spirit.
In the 73rd minute, also on came Tobi Sho-Silva. In the 75th, he motored onto Dickenson’s skilful set-up and finished with beautiful composure. Brunton Park lost its noggin – but then Lewis found space to head Northampton level.
On things went, tension climbing again. In the 94th, Sho-Silva, who offered important late physicality against Brady’s centre-halves, nuisanced Ali Koiki, who handled the ball in Northampton's left-back area, feeling he’d been fouled. No, said ref James Bell. Free-kick Carlisle.
Oh, really? Hmm. Surely not...
Surely yes. Callum Guy’s delivery, Fraser Horsfall’s clumsy handball, penalty. Gibson’s cold blood and clipped finish. Many minutes of utter abandon around Brunton Park. People later leaving, shaking their heads, diving into pints.
To think, a few short weeks ago we assumed the story of this season was written. To think we were drafting the obituaries. Really, you can only laugh. What did we know?
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