Wakey..wakey! Neal’s crazy task of preparing for vital play-off game after County’s 133 days in deep sleep

only came in halfway through the season, if you are the manager you have to take the responsibility.

“I want to lead them back into the League.

“But I think only one club (Bristol Rovers) in the last 15 years has bounced straight back after dropping out of League Two, so history isn’t on our side.”

Ardley’s upbringing in Wimbledon’s Crazy Gang – the original model, not the franchise or the reborn phoenix club he led into League One – has prepared him for most things in football.

But if County make it to Wembley and back through the skylight, their season will have lasted one day short of a full calendar year.

Ordinarily, 12 months of non-stop grind would surely take their toll on any manager but Ardley scoffed: “I’ll tell you about pressure. At Wimbledon, in my first job as a manager, we were bottom of the League and managed to stay up on the last day against Fleetwood.

“I might have lost my first job, and never got a second one, if I hadn’t got it right that day.

“The pressure that day was as great as it could be, so nothing will probably match that for tension.

“But I won’t be putting unnecessary pressure on the players to deliver a happy ending because I think Notts County are in the best place they have been for about 20 years.

“The owners are very intelligent guys and they would not have been planning for promotion in the first year – although we are potentially two games away from making it happen.”

Wakey, wakey, County fans. The Big Sleep is over – unless you’re watching Humphrey Bogart and Lauren Bacall’s film version in black and white.