Town boss McGrath "gutted" after Sutton's last-gasp equaliser at The Shay

Town's opener, through Max Bardell in the 94th minute, looked to have won the game for the hosts before substitute David Ogbonna's even later equaliser salvaged a point for the visitors.

"Gutted. You ask players to do their jobs and overall, I thought, let's be honest, we were really poor first-half, really poor," McGrath said.

"But I thought we were excellent second-half.

"Our energy levels were fantastic and I thought as the second-half went on, they (Sutton) just went and you could see they were settling in for a point.

"When you've got players who don't win their headers, I've watched the goal back and AJ doesn't win the first contact, his man wins the header and his man wins the second contact, and then it's his man who scores the goal.

"So you're talking about people doing their jobs; I keep saying this, in a good way and a bad way, I can't do it with 11 players.

"I brought Dylan off at half-time because he hasn't played football for four, five weeks and brought AJ on, who's been out as well.

"I thought 'well, we haven't got a full-back, because Flinty was injured, we had Raheem injured as well, so let's just give them 45 minutes each'.

"Unfortunately, AJ today didn't do his job. With 30 seconds to go, you've got to be brave enough and bright enough to win your header and put the ball back onto them."

McGrath says losing two points in the way they did overshadows the positives from his team's performance.

"At the end of the day, if we'd continued in our performance and we were rubbish for the second-half, you'd have gone 'OK, 0-0, it was a really bad game'.

"But that was our opportunity to bump up in the league again, against a team who were in the play-offs.

"I thought we were excellent in the second-half, the energy levels were high, we were really intense with it, got the ball wide, I thought Tristan Gill did well on his debut when he came on.

"But whatever league you're in - Sunday League, Premier League, National League, Champions League - you've got to win your headers, you've got to win your battles and you've got to outrun your opposite number.

"For the majority of the day, we did it, even with how nad we were first-half with the ball at our feet, we competed really well, we kept a clean sheet in that first-half, reset and then I thought we were superb second-half.

"We were on the front-foot, moved it really well but all undone by somebody not winning their challenge."

McGrath says a lack of concentration was to blame for Sutton's equaliser.

"It is, it's a lack of desire. I've seen the goal back, it's just a lack of everything," he said.

"It's a really, really childish goal to concede.

"But we conceded it, we have to learn from it, but I'm not going to carry anybody this year.

"I don't fear anybody in this league. We've played a team in the play-offs today, a team on the verge of the play-offs last week in Hornchurch, we played Wealdstone on Tuesday.

"The minimum the boys give me is maximum effort, which I can never deny, but those littel things where you need to just see out games and be a bit more professional with your attiutude towards it, they're the moments that change games and if we look back in May and we finish a point or two short, we're going to revisit this moment."

McGrath says his players have to learn from the experience now.

"There's things that we'll coach, but ultimately, I can't give you the ingredients inside of you to want to go and head a ball, to go and get your head cut or smash a header 80 yards," he said.

"That's something is either in you or not, and unfortunately, in the 93rd minute plus, we didn't have that desire to go and head the ball and ultimately, that's what cost us."

Read more from the Town manager on the Courier website tomorrow.