Nine-man Aldershot Town scored a stoppage-time equaliser to earn a dramatic 2-2 draw at Truro City in the National League.

Shots boss Tommy Widdrington made one change to the side that faced Gateshead as Charlie Penman came in for his debut in place of Jed Meerholz. Ben Jackson and Ryan Jones returned to the matchday squad as substitutes after injuries.

The hosts started on the front foot and Kwame Thomas’ slip just seconds into the action allowed Truro to break forward and win a corner from which Tyler Harvey headed wide at the far post.

After a fast start, the hosts struggled to seriously threaten Shots keeper Marcus Dewhurst’s goal and the game failed to provide a clear goalscoring opportunity for either side for some time.

Up the other end, Josh Barrett and Tristan Abrahams tried chipped efforts. Barrett’s effort was read by Truro keeper Aidan Stone and gathered easily, while Abrahams’ was just over the bar.

The game changed in the 40th minute when Dewhurst was shown a straight red card. Dewhurst cleared the ball forward and after colliding with Truro’s Rekeil Pyke he was given his marching orders and the Shots were reduced to ten men as Pat Nash came on for his Aldershot league debut.

The ten-man Shots took the lead in first-half stoppage time when Barrett’s free kick from the right wing found Thomas at the back post, who shrugged off his marker to head in.

The second half got off to a slow start, but Sam Sanders headed wide from a corner in the 54th minute as Truro looked to make their numerical advantage count.

The hosts won a lot of corners and piled significant pressure on Nash, but the young Shots keeper held his own and broke through the bodies in the six-yard box to punch clear or claim on multiple occasions.

Truro hit the woodwork just after the hour through Harvey as he flicked on Christian Oxlade-Chamberlain’s long throw.

Two minutes later, Truro had their equaliser. Ryan Law cut in from the left wing and curled a superb effort past Nash which went in off the far post.

The rest of the second half was tough for the Shots, but they held firm and defended well.

The evening got even harder for Aldershot in the 84th minute when Will Nightingale went down after conceding a corner and was visibly hurt.

Truro scored from the resulting corner, which the Shots had to defend with nine men, as Harvey bundled the ball in from close range.

Nightingale was limping and could barely break into a jog, but with the visitors having already made all of their substitutions he opted to stay on.

The Shots were officially reduced to nine men two minutes into stoppage time when Cameron Hargreaves – who had been shown a yellow card for saying something to referee James Durkin – was shown a second yellow card for stopping a counter-attack.

There were loud appeals for a home penalty when Dom Johnson-Fisher went down in the box, but Durkin adjudged that Johnson-Fisher had dived and showed him a yellow card.

The Shots were then awarded a penalty in stoppage time when Jackson was shoved in the Truro box. James Henry stepped up and scored an excellent penalty that gave Stone no chance, despite diving the right way.