Carlisle United 2 Fleetwood Town 3: This is a relegation battle until Carlisle United prove otherwise. For those still of the opinion that it’s too early to go in with that judgement, and that it is too “negative” – ah, such a lovely, cosy, complacent, dismissive word – let’s have some evidence to contest it, not just blind faith and own-the-north belief.
Five defeats from six: that’s bottom-end stuff. Fourteen goals conceded in those six: that’s rubbish, frankly. Output that leads your captain to declare himself “embarrassed”…yeah, we might be in this for the long haul, you know.
The only conceivable way United will not be in an skirmish for their EFL lives, for the rest of 2024/25, is by putting enough performances of substance on the table from here on in. This remains way beyond their reach right now. Hence…alarm bells.
Let us, then, live in the cold reality rather than skip through an imagined future of promotion parties and far-off climbs to the Championship. United’s new head coach, whomever he is and whenever he will be unveiled, is going to receive a hospital pass of sorts here.
Don’t spare him sympathy – this is the job, this is the challenge, and such things do not often come in good times – but before Carlisle settle snugly into thoughts of a new dawn with a fancy style of play, this is a task of results, and of being as horrible as necessary in pursuit of them.
It is assumed by many that United have plenty of individual quality in this squad, if only someone could bring together all these disparate parts. Let us see. The system, the method, to make a team out of the raw materials is certainly yet to be found.
But, in all honesty…are all the pieces really there? Again, if yes, show us, don’t tell us. Injuries aside, can Carlisle today make the argument for possessing a squad for the upper end of League Two when their midfield is as shoddy as it was in Saturday’s first half, their defence as gaping as it was?
Not yet. Not nearly. Is this an able squad that’s been misdirected, or are some reputations making promises they cannot keep? Again – give us the answers in deed, not word or theory. Find the team that United, in this worrying shape, can beat. And please, don’t be long about it.
As of today only a crisis-ridden Morecambe, with a team cobbled together midway through pre-season, plus a sterile, downwardly-mobile Accrington Stanley are worse off in terms of points. United have had the muscle to outspend those and many others at their level, yet are looking like a collection of players without a plan. And the modern game is savage on those without a plan.
Charlie Wyke’s rediscovery of the goalscoring knack is about the only benefit to come from this latest defeat, to the latest opposition team to look more capable, more refined, more drilled than the Blues. Fleetwood right now are 12th.
Brunton Park on this damp September day had the usual pre-match hum plus added speculation swirling about team selection and head coach/sporting director selection. United’s caretaker coaches ditched a couple of January’s ‘step-change’ midfield signings, Harrison Neal and Josh Vela, and rejigged with Dylan McGeouch recalled, Jon Mellish pushed forward, and Dominic Sadi and Jordan Jones either side of Wyke.
However it looked on paper, or in theory, the results were…not good. Fleetwood forced a cluster of little chances before the second minute had passed, then Ryan Graydon ran beyond Sam Lavelle, forcing Aaron Hayden to step in. Early signs of United not being tight enough, of ushering the visitors into large spaces.
Their command of the ball was also bad enough that Fleetwood could steal possession numerous times in the United half. From one such occasion, when Cameron Harper was ambushed, they scored: Danny Mayor eventually receiving it on the left, dancing past a couple of rumoured challenges then firing past Harry Lewis.
Mellish, barrelling forward, hit the post in response but Carlisle’s football was otherwise paltry. More shoddy passing down the middle allowed Ronan Coughlan to run free, he smacked a shot high past Lewis as the flag stayed down, 19 minutes had gone and United, by this point, had been structurally awful.
It was not until late in the half that United looked like they might at least half bind together and produce some football that could test Charlie Adam’s nimble set. Harrison Biggins pulled a shot wide and then Jones, at last running at the defence, jinked into the box and went down as Brendan Wiredu slid in.
Finally, some flair. And finally a Wyke goal: a confident penalty ending the striker’s recent struggles. The caretakers overhauled the formation at the break, going from 4-1-4-1 to 3-5-2, and United’s renewed bite remained. Wyke was denied at the last moment after a Biggins cross, then McGeouch hungrily gathered the ball on the right, eased away from his man and curled a dream of a low cross onto Wyke’s toe: 2-2.
It proved a fragile truce. Jones and sub Luke Armstrong were denied and one dared to speculate that Carlisle might go on from here. Instead, bluster that gradually fizzled away. Armstrong failed to control a good Mellish cross and Harper curled a free-kick over the bar, but duly Adam’s triple substitution took effect. Elliott Bonds restored some stature to their midfield and Phoenix Patterson added width to the left.
From that side, a cross broke for Mayor to smack in the visitors’ third, Carlisle again far from ruthless enough when they had the ball themselves moments before. And from there, one sensed the previous, revived belief had gone, and it was back to the old toil.
The closing 25 minutes or so were United back to their futile selves. Vela forced a save from David Harrington but nobody else came close. Bonds and Coughlan could have added a Fleetwood fourth. Jones, at the very end, overran a last, desperate dribble and as fans trickled out, ‘Bittersweet Symphony’ played over the PA system.
If it was supposed to be a soundtrack for the mood, someone will have to tell us which had been the sweet bit.
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