Paul Wotton said to lose to Worthing on Tuesday night would have been a ‘travesty’ - so he was delighted that Cody Cooke’s injury-time penalty made it 2-2 and rescued a point from a fiery National League South game in West Sussex.

Torquay went fourth with the draw, which saw two red cards shown in the space of four minutes: one to Worthing’s Sam Beard in the 75th minute after a bad tackle on Jordan Thomas; the other a questionable one to Torquay’s Sam Dreyer when he tangled with Temi Babalola in the 79th minute.

Torquay were chasing the game then. The first three goals all came in the first half. Worthing opened the scoring in the 15th minute when Joe Partington headed the ball home from a corner. A fantastic free-kick by Jordan Young in the 20th minute made it 1-1 - but the Gulls fell behind again in the 38th minute when Liam Nash scored with a header from a Danny Cashman cross.

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In the second half, Wotton threw on Matt Jay and Omar Mussa, as planned, to run at the Worthing defence with fresh legs, and after a good chance by Jay almost saw the game become level, it was Cooke who was brought down in the box in the 92nd minute, and it was Cooke who hammered the ball home.

Wotton said: “I think it was a very good football game with lots of incidents. I actually think our whole game-plan worked perfectly all night - but we conceded two really poor goals. Two free headers in our six yard box is not acceptable.

“I thought in the second, we should win the game. I thought we kept going and stepped into the game really well. There were so many chances that just didn’t drop.

“I am so, so happy we scored because to lose tonight would have been a travesty really. Is a point a fair result? I thought we shaded it. I thought we were very brave and we went for it. Worthing are excellent, by the way. I thought we had some fantastic performances.”

The red card for Dreyer is worrying, with centre back Jordan Dyer out for up to a month, and full back Jay Foulston also out of action for a similar time-frame. Dreyer will be able to play against Hornchurch at Plainmoor on Saturday because any ban will kick in after a week - but the manager said the club will appeal against the red card anyway. There is another worry, Young came off with a groin strain and may not be fit by the weekend.

“I thought the officiating was poor, I thought it was poor all night,” said Wotton. “We didn’t get any 50-50 decisions at all. Lots of offsides were very dubious. The Dreyer sending off is scandalous. We’ll appeal that - I personally feel that it’s a foul on him, then Sam does pull him down, I have got no problem with that. James Hamon heads the ball and we have got Fin Craske and Ed Palmer within two yards of the ball. He’s not the last man. And then he gives the penalty at the end and doesn’t send off their player, who makes no clear effort to play the ball.”

The point saw Torquay go up a place to fourth. Dorking Wanderers are top (played 33, 62 points), Working are second (30, 59), Eastbourne Borough, who Torquay beat 2-0 last Saturday, are third (32, 58) and the Gulls have 56 points from 31 games. Boreham Wood (31, 55), Maidstone United (32, 55) are fifth and sixth, and Truro City (31, 54) complete the play-off places. The title is still anyone’s to claim.

Wotton said: “I’m not disappointed we didn’t win, I thought we were great. It’s up to us now to follow it up on Saturday with a good performance, and hopefully get three points.”