Boss John Gregory hailed the character of his side as Crawley came from behind to beat leaders Leyton Orient 3-2 at Brisbane Road.
Goals from Gary Alexander, Andry Drury and Nicky Adams sealed a first league win in ten attempts to lift Reds to 12th place in League One.
Gregory said: "It was a great performance and it was great for the fans who possibly travelled up here not expecting too much.
"Not many people gave us much of a chance here so we were able to go out and be positive. I felt they took the lead against the run of play but once we got it back to 1-1 we took over.
"We could have won more comfortably as we had a couple of good chances when it was 3-1 but in the end we had to hang on a bit at the end.
"But this group have got great character and have showed a lot of resilience since I took over."
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