ANOTHER below-par refereeing display from a familiar face was the main talking point after Boxing Day honours were even at Gresty Road.

Tom Neild came under fire back in February from Dave Artell over a raft of 'poor' penalty decisions which proved costly in defeat at Plymouth.

This time Crewe got off lightly as the official ignored Fleetwood handball appeals against Mikael Mandron as the frontman made the most of an Omar Beckles knockdown to sink a 61st-minute equaliser.

Fleetwood also had a first-half effort from Charlie Mulgrew chalked out for offside, although the draw was the fairest result after a game which livened up following a drab start, but sadly missed the input of a Boxing Day crowd as the new tier three restrictions deepened everyone's gloom over the holiday period.

"We didn't play particularly well, but I think it was just one of those games where things didn't work out. Our decision making was poor, but if you don't play well you have to make sure you don't lose," said Artell, who admitted the absence of fans after two games in their presence was a blow.

"It's very difficult to improve your performances week on week and today wasn't as good as we have produced recently.

"100 per cent the fans were missed. One of the staff said to me after five minutes, it's different without them in the ground. And that was 2,000, never mind five or six thousand. So I hope they're back soon and I hope this vaccine gets rolled out in the millions."

Fleetwood assistant boss Clint Hill, performing press duties afterwards, said manager Joey Barton had lost his voice; no doubt from a relentless tirade upon an official who was too quick to draw out his yellow card.

Six times in all for a game that was scrappy, but not bad tempered. Its low key start was broken by a flurry of goalmouth action when Fleetwood winger Wes Burns looped Josh Morris' cross onto the far post and Mulgrew cleared a Charlie Kirk effort off the line.

Oli Finney should have applied a finishing touch to Owen Dale's handiwork soon after the restart, but Crewe found themselves behind when Beckles failed to be decisive, gingerly shepherding the ball in the direction of Will Jaaskelainen, allowing Burns to nip and prod home the opener (49).

But the equaliser was soon coming when Harry Pickering drove a free kick forward and Mandron profited to drive in.

Both Luke Murphy and Fleetwood sub Mark Duffy went close to nicking a winner as did Harry Pickering, whose deflected effort was just about held on his goalline by Jayson Leutwiler.

But while there was plenty to moan about Mr Neild's showing there could be few complaints about the outcome.

Fleetwood assistant Hill said: "The referee didn't have a good game. For Crewe's equaliser he missed three decisions, including a foul on Charlie Mulgrew and a handball.

"We were compact and we'd probably done enough to see the game out but decisions have gone against us."

Crewe: Jaaskelainen; Johnson, Beckles, Offord, Pickering; Wintle, Murphy, Finney (Lowery); Dale (Powell), Mandron, Kirk. Subs: Richards, Adebisi, Porter, Zanzala.

Fleetwood: Leutwiler; Edwards, Connolly, Mulgrew, Andrew; Burns(Coutts), Rossiter, Whelan, Morris (Duffy); Camps, Madden (Saunders). Subs: Cairns, McKay, Hill, Rydel