Crawley manager Scott Lindsey feels his players have proved everybody wrong after they booked their place in the League Two play-off final by thrashing MK Dons on their own patch.
A year on from saving the Red Devils from relegation from the Football League, Lindsey has guided the club to their first visit to Wembley Stadium in their 128-year history.
They will face Crewe next Sunday for the right to play in League One next season and they will be confident of earning just their second promotion to English football’s third tier after Danilo Orsi’s hat-trick inspired them to a thumping victory at Stadium MK.
Lindsey, whose side won 5-1 on Saturday night to seal an 8-1 aggregate win, said: “[It’s an] unbelievable feeling to take such a wonderful football club to Wembley for the first time.
“I’m really proud of everybody who’s been involved with the work that’s gone in to get to this stage, it’s just incredible. I’m just really proud.
“We were backed to go down, we’ve proved a lot of people wrong, and I want to thank everybody for not backing us.
“I want to thank everybody for that because it’s fuelled me and the players, so thanks for that, but we’re not there yet.
“We’ve got it all to do and we will still remain really humble, we’ll still remain really focused and professional.
“As much as we want to enjoy tonight – which we will – there’s no point getting to Wembley if you’re not going to win, so we’re really focused on that.”
Crawley opened up a 2-0 lead on the night through Jay Williams’ third-minute opener and Orsi’s first goal before Max Dean, who later had a penalty saved, pulled one back for MK Dons.
Orsi then rounded off a superb move with his second and after Jack Roles had rifled in a fourth for the visitors, he completed his hat-trick in stoppage time.
MK Dons boss Mike Williamson said: “It was a really tough one for the boys, I really feel for the boys.
“I think we’ve suffered – that was probably the hardest football match I’ve ever had to watch – and we’ve come up short, so there’s a lot for me to digest right now.
“I’m not going to measure our season since coming in on two games and it’s really important for us to keep that perspective, but right now the emotion is very raw and the lads in there are hurting.
“I’ve been in football a long time, I’ve felt hurt like this before and this is down there with the worst, so I want to learn everything.
“I want to feel everything that I possible can and I want to use it because we’ve got to come back in pre-season focused and we’ve got a lot of work to do.”
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