On reflection it was a fair result, however gutting at the time. As per last season, Carlisle (and their fans) are far to full of themselves and flattered to deceive and, once we had weathered the 'wounded animal' opening domination, we began to find spaces, put some great moves together and found the net.
The game was ruined, of course, by the sending off - a silly challenge in a dangerous area. After this we inevitably sat back but defended brilliantly until the death. If we had held on to 11 players I truly believe that we would have won comfortably - Carlisle offered so little going forward and were tiring.
I felt that Jones, Obeng and McCormick didn't really match the high standards that they set against Scunthorpe. However, Ratcliffe, Walker, McGavin, Westbrook and, particularly, Barker were great.
There is a huge amount to be positive about in that performance and I'm hoping that the Gateshead game will give us the space and freedom to really start to show what we can do.
But please - let's score more than one goal and not go into a third injury period with a slender advantage!