NINE-man Poole Town heroically held out for a 2-2 draw in an incident-packed derby date with Weymouth that was low on quality.

In front of a bumper crowd of 1,053, the defiant Dolphins battled back from Stewart Yetton’s fortuitous strike on the stroke of half-time, despite the dismissal of midfielder Steve Devlin five minutes after the restart.

It was substitute Richard Gillespie who lit the blue touch paper for the hosts, dragging a deft back-heel beyond the despairing dive of Jason Matthews on the hour before lashing home Carl Preston’s deep cross at the far post three minutes later.

However, an uncharacteristic moment of petulance from Nick Hutchings saw the hosts reduced to nine when the Poole keeper clipped referee Mark Derrien round the back of the head after he was booked for time wasting.

Ex-Dolphins man Luke Burbidge came back to haunt the hosts with a swirling drive that flew past substitute keeper Dan Thomas with 12 minutes to play.

And there was more controversy in the closing stages when Thomas clattered Terras’ player-assistant manager Matt Groves in the penalty area before the visitors claimed Poole defender Sam Clarke had handled a goal-bound effort on the line.

But with Derrien – already the villain of the piece in the eyes of the Tatnam faithful – unmoved by Weymouth’s protests, Brendon King’s toothless Terras were forced to settle for a share of the spoils.

King criticised Derrien at full-time for not pointing to the spot, but admitted he was relieved to escape with a point following a poor performance – sentiments echoed by Killick following the feisty finish to his 500th match in charge of Poole.

The Weymouth manager said: “The lads were absolutely adamant the keeper had taken him out and it was a penalty. It doesn’t matter whether he had sent off two, three or 10, he had to give that decision.

“But we were poor and lucky to come away with a point, if I’m honest. It was a pretty scrappy game and we didn’t get it down and pass it like we could.”

Meanwhile, King agreed with both of Poole’s red cards, while Killick found it hard to disagree with his counterpart.

“The two red cards might not have been given on another day but I wouldn’t try to make out they were ridiculous mistakes by any means,” said Killick.

“They certainly appeared to have at least one very good penalty appeal turned down so I wouldn’t go raging about the officials. I was more disappointed with our performance.

“We needed to play a lot better than that, particularly in the first half when we had 11 men and I thought the occasion got the better of us a little bit.”

However, the Dolphins boss was irked over Will Spetch’s disallowed goal in the first half, one of three strikes Poole had chalked off. “We were adamant that goal should have stood,” added Killick.

Dolphins: Hutchings, Clarke, Spetch, Whisken, Oliver (Brooks, 53), Pettefer, Elliott (Gillespie, 53), Devlin, Davies (Thomas, 66), Preston, Cann. Unused subs: Byerley, Davis.