Rotherham manager Steve Evans dedicated his side’s dramatic come-back win on penalties against Leyton Orient, to win promotion to the Championship, to his tragically sick brother and sister-in-law.

His eldest brother Hugh had a stroke last week and while he was having a three-hour operation his wife Kathleen was also in hospital getting radiotherapy for cancer.

‘That was to him and his wife,’ Evans said after his side’s victory in the League One play-off final. ‘He sent me a text saying what it would mean to our dad, who we lost 23 years ago. I’m not playing the religious card, I don’t believe in that, but he sorted us out.’

Orient fans thought their 32-year wait to get back into the second tier of English football was over when they took a two-goal lead in the first half.

But Alex Revell’s double after the break restored parity and after the sides could not be separated in extra time, goalkeeper Adam Collin saved Orient’s last two penalties to complete back-to-back promotions.

Many call shoot-outs a lottery, but Collin won his seventh in seven attempts, saving at least two in each of them.

The game was nervy, tense and error-strewn in the first half-an-hour until Orient’s young winger Moses Odubajo woke up Wembley with a goal fit for the occasion.

On 35 minutes the ball came back out of Rotherham’s penalty area and he cushioned it with his chest before unleashing a first-time volley with his weaker left foot which was so powerful it flew over Collin’s and in.

The game looked over when Orient added a second just four minutes later and it was Odubajo who again caused Rotherham problems.

The 20-year-old found space in behind their defence on the right and left Dean Cox with tap-in with a low ball across the box, which his counterpart on the opposite flank finished.

But Evans knows how to win promotions — that was the eighth time in his career he has led a team up and the fourth time in a row, after successive promotions with Crawley before he joined Rotherham in 2012 — and he produced a rousing speech during the break.

‘My assistant said the players will need you to dig them out of the trenches and take them to the top of the mountain,’ he explained.

‘I spoke to them about what it would mean to their families, looking back on this day because if you get thumped it could be a bad day.

‘And I reminded them that Billy Davies,who has had lots of success, rang me and said when you get to later on and the game is starting to go forward it’s not about tactical nous, it’s about hunger and desire to win a football match and I thought we did that.’

The Chuckle Brothers were in attendance and even took out a full-page advert in the official match-day programme showing support for their home-town club Rotherham.

At that point, there was absolutely nothing to laugh about, but then they were treated to a ‘To me, to you’ kind of game and Rotherham fans started to believe they still had a chance when they pulled a goal back on 55 minutes.

Orient goalkeeper Jamie Jones had a horror moment when he came to punch a ball sent into the box and missed it, allowing Revell to poke into an open net when the ball fell to him.

Five minutes later Revell had hauled his side level with a stunning strike.

The striker controlled the ball with his knee, then lobbed Jones with a shot from 35-yards which looped into the right of the net.

Evans took his large frame hurling down the touchline in a Jose Mourinho-esque celebration.

Neither side could pull ahead and it went to an agonising shoot out, where Collin saved from Mathieu Baudry and then the last kick of the game from Chris Dagnall.

A shattered Orient manager Russell Slade said: ‘It’s been a wonderful journey from day one and it’s a pleasure to work with these players every day.’

—Daily Mail