Paul Simpson heaped praise on his side for a “ruthless” display after Carlisle climbed to second in Sky Bet League Two with their biggest away win of the season.
Carlisle marked Simpson’s first year back in charge in style with an eighth win in the last 12 games, 5-2 at Crawley.
The Cumbrians raced into a 4-0 lead after only 38 minutes with goals from Joel Senior, Omari Patrick, Owen Moxon and Morgan Feeney.
Substitute Aramide Oteh and Dom Telford were on target in the second half for Crawley in between Jon Mellish’s fifth for the Cumbrians, as the Reds remained in the bottom two with a third successive defeat.
Boss Simpson summed up his men as “outstanding” and added: “We were ruthless in the first half and my only disappointment is that we conceded two really sloppy goals.
“Coming here I wasn’t sure what Crawley would be like, but we swarmed all over them and it was a reward for a good week’s training.
“If you sniff a weakness you don’t feel sorry for them, and this gives us a huge lift, ticking over nicely, second in the table.
“In the first half we were outstanding; at 4-0 it’s difficult to keep the same intensity, but you can’t complain at winning 5-2 away from home.”
Crawley’s defeat leaves them with only one win from their last 10 games, two points behind third bottom Hartlepool, and boss Scott Lindsey described the performance as “horrendous.”
The former Swindon manager added: “It was very poor and I can only apologise to our fans who paid to watch it.
“There were lots of differences between us and Carlisle and they wanted it more than us.
“All the goals we conceded were soft, they were embarrassing and there were some choice words said at half-time.
“It is too easy to score against us at the moment but at 4-0 down I felt we could have scored more than two goals.”
Lindsey, the Reds’ third permanent boss this season, remains confident the situation can be turned around, adding: “We’ve got to get back on the horse very quickly to put it right.
“They are all tough games, whether top or the bottom of the table.
“We’ve got to win a big chunk of the 16 games we have left and with the players we have I am confident we can do that.”
