Gary Johnson expects leaders to emerge from ranks when needed

Manager Gary Johnson wants his team's leaders to come to the fore in order to shrug off his Yeovil Town team's "boy next door" tag.

The Glovers raced into a 2-0 lead against Crawley Town on Tuesday only to collapse after the break and end up drawing 2-2, with the Reds staking a claim for all three points.

The hosts' capitulation after the injury-enforced substitution of Jamie McAllister came as no coincidence, as again Johnson's men struggled without their influential left-back and captain.

The manager conceded he thought missing McAllister would have a detrimental impact on the team but said now was the time for others to step up ahead of next Tuesday's npower League One clash with Swindon Town.

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"Nathan Ralph did well at left-back when he came on but he's not a leader yet," Johnson said. "When Jamie goes off, I'm looking for other leaders and captains and the mental state that is going to rally the troops, lead them and let them know in no uncertain terms that they are not performing.

"That is the problem with your boy-next-door team. We knew this might be a problem, but we have to find those leaders. If it's not with what they are saying, it's got to be with their play. They need to lead by example, and we certainly didn't have that in talk or in action against Crawley."

As for McAllister's foot injury that he first aggravated against Doncaster Rovers and caused his 24th-minute midweek removal, Johnson added: "I am not sure myself yet how bad it is, we haven't had time to talk about that yet.

"We will wait and see. He looked uncomfortable from the off and it was unfortunate that was what happened. I would still expect that we would have enough to see it through, but on the day we were not up for it in the second half."

While Jamaica Under-20 captain Omar Holness remains on trial with the Glovers, Monday's new signing, Ben Gordon, made his full debut against Crawley, replacing abdominal muscle injury victim Sam Foley.

The former Chelsea youngster – released by the Barclays Premier League club in January – set up Byron Webster's opener against the Sussex side but was replaced by Dominic Blizzard on 66 minutes, after starting to tire.