BLACKBURN Rovers today lodged a formal appeal with the Football Association over the red card shown to Tugay during Sunday's tempestuous 1-1 draw with Tottenham Hotspur.

Manager Mark Hughes launched a scathing attack on referee Phil Dowd after the Staffordshire official decided to dismiss Tugay - and award Spurs a penalty - for his challenge on midfielder Hossam Ghaly on the hour mark.

Hughes said Dowd had had a shocker' and immediately vowed to appeal against the veteran midfielder's sending off.

That appeal has now landed at FA headquarters, and Rovers must prove that Tugay did not deny Ghaly an obvious goalscoring opportunity', otherwise the veteran Turk faces the prospect of sitting out next week's Premiership clash with Fulham at Ewood Park.

Rovers' chairman, John Williams, said: "We've lodged an appeal - we spent most of yesterday working on it - so we'll see what happens next.

"We think we've got good grounds for an appeal, but it's now in the hands of the FA and we await their response."

Dowd's general performance - he also failed to spot a clear handball by Mido in the opposing penalty area - was widely condemned by the Rovers camp.

Defender Stephane Henchoz said: "Without the referee's decision against us, we would have won that game.

"He (the referee) gave a penalty, then a red card, which it wasn't.

"It was very hard to take but even with 10 men we showed we wanted to win the game.

"We posed Tottenham a lot of problems and physically we were the better side."