Rovers may appeal Coppinger red card

Coppinger was dismissed in the last minute after appearing to briefly grab Plymouth keeper Luke McCormick by the throat in a melee which followed a penalty miss by Liam Mandeville.

McCormick darted over to goad Mandeville after his spot kick struck the outside of the post, with skipper Coppinger among those rushing in to defend his young team mate.

The 35-year-old’s red card was the only punishment which referee Oliver Langford handed out from the incident and Rovers will now explore the possibility of appealing the decision.

“I’m going to look at it,” Ferguson told The Star. “We can appeal.

“We’ll sit down on Monday as a club and make a decision.

“I think the reaction of their goalkeeper is a poor one. I think he’ll know that himself.

“You don’t want to see that.

“Liam’s missed a penalty. That’s it.

“He’s quite an experienced goalkeeper to do that.

“After, James has reacted and stuck up for his team mate and why wouldn’t he.

“There was no need for that to happen.

“The referee has sent him off straight away.

“In a game like that, with conditions wet and slippy, it was very unusual for a home team to not get one yellow card, very unusual.”

Ferguson was not pleased with referee Langford’s performance, particularly his decision to award a penalty for Plymouth which saw the hosts take a 2-0 lead.

“You hope you get one or two decisions,” Ferguson said.

“The lad has ran straight into Andy Butler and the ball is already in Marko Marosi’s hands.

“He’s run straight into him. The ball has run away from the lad.

“The referee has made a decision and we feel it was very soft.

“It’s made it difficult for us but at that stage we still felt we could get something out of the game.

“I haven’t had a go at the players. I said we tried to do the right things, we needed a bit more quality at times,

“We changed the formation towards the end to get the width because crosses into the box were causing them problems.”

Ferguson confirmed Andy Butler was taken off for tactical reasons rather than an injury.