United's 27 year old central midfielder Chris Lumsdon, who has been the only Carlisle player to start every game so far this season, was dealt an early blow during the Brentford game on Saturday when he had to be replaced by Neale McDermott, following a crunching tackle in the centre of the park in the 19th minute.

We managed to get his assessment of the knock on Saturday evening, and he told us: "Well, that's what you get when you are on the same team as your best mate and he stitches you up with a pass like that! To be serious though, I knew it wasn't going to be good when I went for it, because we both had to go in for the ball. It turned out worse for me when my foot got stuck in the turf and his studs came right in to my ankle. I tried to run it off, but there was just no way, he'd caught me full on."

"I have my own remedy for it," he explained. "I'll be down in the sea at Whitley Bay tomorrow morning and, having done it the last time something like this happened to me, I can tell you that it works. I know it sounds silly, but a dip in the sea over there will take the swelling down."

"To be honest," he continued, "I've not really had a knock like this one before so I'm going to be optimistic. I'm telling everyone that I'm going to be fit and ready for Wednesday and they all give me strange looks, but I'll work towards that."

On the subject of coming off so early against the Bees, he said: "You do tend to get a feel for the game in the first few minutes, and it was one of those where I think myself, Muzza and Thirls were going to boss it a bit. We were starting to get a bit of a grip on the game and then that tackle happened. It's more than a bit disappointing. I then had some treatment in the dressing room and I was too gutted to come back out until we got in to the second half. I made my way down to the bench after about ten minutes and I think it's exactly as the lads have been saying, we could have won that one. We're all disappointed that we're not leaving here with 3 points. If we had used a bit more quality in that final third then we would be looking at things diferently now. Mind you, it's a point away from home, which is better than getting beat in the last minute, as we have done in the past."

"We've got a great game to look forward to on Wednesday now," he told us, "especially after the way we played down there. If we play anything like that then we'll be adding to our points tally, and I just hope that I'll have my ankle sorted in time to be involved."