Carlisle United target second on season's longest trip to Crawley Town

Simpson takes his promotion-chasing Blues side to Crawley Town today knowing victory, along with a draw or defeat for Stevenage against Tranmere Rovers, would put them in the top two.

It would further underline their remarkable progress since Simpson’s second reign began a year ago at a time United were in deep relegation trouble.

Manager Simpson believes his side are capable of overtaking Stevenage and continuing to make their presence felt in the automatic promotion race.

Asked if he felt Carlisle could catch the current second-placed side, he said: “The simple answer is yes. I am disappointed we haven’t caught them already.

“I look at that Harrogate game at home, the Mansfield game, Wimbledon away, as [games where] we’ve dropped points that have cost us the opportunity to go second in the table.

“They are certainly catchable. The only way we can catch them is if we keep winning games of football.

LISTEN: Paul Simpson on his year in charge, fans, injuries and Crawley

“We can’t do anything about them. We’ve just got to win ours. If we do that, yes we can.

“If we don’t win games of football, we’ve got other issues to concern ourselves with and that’s the big challenge for us – make sure we do our jobs properly, make sure we’re winning games and the rest will take care of itself.”

It is a year to the weekend that Carlisle went to Leyton Orient for Simpson's first game back - in second bottom position (Image: Richard Parkes)

United today take on a Crawley side who are second bottom in League Two, though they have several games in hand on relegation rivals.

The Blues are again set to be backed by impressive travelling support on their longest journey of the season.

Despite the 696-mile round trip, the Blue Army are heading to Sussex in their hundreds, and Simpson said: “They’re incredible. The amount of miles they do…the supporters who make these journeys deserve a medal for it.

“It started at Leyton Orient last year – we had an incredible turnout there. I didn’t know what I was going to get from the players, and I certainly didn’t know what I was going to get from the supporters, but when I came out at the start of that game at Orient and looked over and saw the numbers, it gives you that feeling if we all work together, we’ve got a chance of achieving something.

“That’s what I’ve tried to say from day one of coming in and hopefully we can carry on doing that.”

Simpson wants his side to show no mercy to a Crawley team who have won one in nine.

He added: “I want a really positive mindset that we’re going there to get a win – not going not to lose.

“I want [Crawley] to have a horrible afternoon, it’s as simple as that. Once we’ve played them I’m not really bothered what happens to Crawley.

“That’s not me being disrespectful. We’ve got enough to concern ourselves with.

“Nobody felt sorry for us last year when we were at the bottom of the table. We had to earn the right to stay in the league.

“If Crawley earn the right to stay up, credit to them, fair play. We’ve got to earn the right to stay up in the top places.

“If we can do our job properly we at least stay third and then we’ll take whatever comes if people around us don’t do their job right.”