Welcome to Carlisle, Callum. Enjoying your debut? Now up you get. A few more minutes, and then: the end. Brunton Park greets the final whistle with a roar from somewhere near the bowels of the earth.

People shout and cheer and howl partly because they don’t particularly know what to say or think. They do all that some more, and then United’s ground a few minutes later is a collective headshake. What, frankly, have we all just witnessed?

A few hours after the event and it’s still hard to make rational sense of it. Other than the ancient truth that this is Carlisle United, and every so often these things will happen when Carlisle United are involved, there is no getting events into any sensible order.

Sometimes…it just happens, and we can only wallow in the crazy reality of it happening. The goals, the red cards, the defending, the monumental spirit of it all. Nine-man Carlisle 3, Harrogate 0. So how are you finding it so far, Callum?

Josh Williams curls in the opener (Image: Ben Holmes)

United’s new loan signing had not played a league game since last November. Before the game the Stockport County midfielder made an understated arrival, walking through the Blues’ Halloween event along from the Neil Centre, washbag in hand and meeting young fans, a new venture about to start.

On the bench to begin with. A partial introduction. A few minutes maybe, get your game time up. Ha. Not on your life. Camps was sent on in the first half to shore up a midfield that had, by the 30-minute mark, lost most of its staff. On you go, son. You’ve got to do the job of at least two men.

Thankfully, everyone else in a blue shirt was already doing the same. And, on this night for the ages – one of the pottiest Carlisle victories any of us can remember – they did not just hold Harrogate off but hurt them too.

This is perhaps the most notable tribute on an evening of many. Their second and third goals came when the odds were heaviest: the Blues one up but severely depleted, and everyone in the ground wondering, deep down, when the visiting team would find the hole in the dam. Instead, United executed a sweeping, breakaway goal through Callum Whelan, then a stunning, merry gallop up the pitch by Ryan Galvin, the substitute left-back who was somehow the furthest outfield player in Harrogate’s half.

As the ball popped back out from a challenge and allowed Galvin to complete his goal, the most surreal feeling took hold. Was this really happening? Was this even football?

Whatever it was, those attacks were true bravery, just as much as the goalline clearances and the countless things Adam Desbois did in the name of a clean sheet that must have felt like several. Riled by a sense of injustice, fuelled by an angry sort of unity, Carlisle did a complete job here. They did not just survive this game; they truly won it.

And to think this was a side inviting, a few weeks ago, serious questions about its collective aptitude, its ability to grind. There ought to be no going back to those places after this. Nights like this won’t happen often, but United now have a well they can keep drawing from. Do they care? Did they? Does it matter enough?

Harvey Bunker is the second Carlisle player to see red (Image: Ben Holmes)

Goodness me, yes. Against an in-form Harrogate side they had never beaten in league football, thoughts of jinxes and curses took a fresh form as the volatile first half came about, with one man at its centre.

What happened from the 14th minute onwards made the preceding action feel like the unfolding of a gentle village fete unfolding. Harrogate began with their possession game, looking clipped and controlled, but United made the first incision, Josh Williams snaking in from the left and curling sweetly home.

Miguel Azeez, moments later, came close to a second and that was the very last moment this game existed in a semi-normal environment. The first red card came when United’s progress down the left, from Desbois to Morgan Feeney to Azeez, ended with a heavy touch inside by the midfielder and a stretching challenge on Morgan Williams which referee Jamie Robinson deemed dangerous and studs-up.

Brunton Park fumed its disagreement, not knowing more was to come. Rob Elliot and his staff were in near-permanent dialogue with the fourth official, and assistant boss Louis Storey, for his protesting, was swiftly into the book.

Every decision or non-decision from Robinson now came loaded with controversy and the succession of them was already feeling like more than the home contingent could take. And then, after chances for Harrogate’s Ciaran McGuckin and Ellis Taylor, United protested at an offside decision that did not come, before Harvey Bunker’s innocuous-looking challenge on Josh Hmami brought the red card leaping back out of Robinson’s back pocket.

The place was now in ferment, and United’s nine survivors were quickly recast as would-be heroes in the trenches. Carlisle camped behind the ball to handle Harrogate attacks, broke daringly for a couple of chances including a Feeney header which Luke Hutchinson tipped over, then more defensive stuff before David Ajiboye was sacrificed for Camps as Elliot restocked his midfield.

Callum Whelan slots home the second (Image: Ben Holmes)

The head coach, at this point and later, was proactive with his rearrangements, moving the pieces into different positions, striving to anticipate as much as possible amid the shifting tides. When a Robinson decision went United’s way, for a foul on Micah Obiero, the celebrations were akin to a goal having been scored. Obiero and others were everywhere in the ensuing effort, which saw Carlisle survive more shots from Williams and Hmami before the Blues players were bellowed to the tunnel at the break.

Can you quite grasp what happened next? Twenty-one seconds into the second half, Callum Whelan stroked sweetly home after terrific work by Williams. And then…Galvin. Inexplicable, clean-through Galvin, who celebrated his goal by producing imaginary cards. Wit amid the chaos.

There was still half-an-hour to go. Brad Nicholson forced another Carlisle chance, before Feeney produced goalline heroics to deny George Thomson. Desbois then swelled in stature, saving multiple times from Brad Dolaghan and Hmami, as well as claiming numerous crosses as the pressure rained down.

Ryan Galvin brandishes imaginary cards after scoring United's third (Image: Ben Holmes)

It was inspiring stuff from United’s keeper and those ahead of him, even as Harrogate surrendered invention in favour of repeated crosses which Carlisle’s defence ate up. Clearances were hailed, challenges saluted, blocks regarded as little victories, each Harrogate inaccuracy something to revel in.

There were brief moments in the siege when Galvin and the terrific Leo Duru threatened to slip through Harrogate again, but this time they were stopped in their tracks. This may have been the visitors’ only real success of the night: preventing nine-man Carlisle United from scoring a fourth.

Carlisle's players and staff in a huddle after the game (Image: Ben Holmes)

Yes, that sentence is real, all of this was real. It’s not always like this, Callum. But you’ll know already that, now and again, we do things differently here.