Albion will fight a shock red card for substitute Craig Davies in last night’s friendly defeat at Torquay – providing video footage proves his innocence.

The Welsh striker was sent-off in the second half by referee Mike Cairns after clashing with Mark Ellis.

Davies received a straight red card for an alleged head-butt and could be facing a three-match ban.

Albion boss Russell Slade said: “Losing Craig is a bit of a blow. We are going to probably contest it. We need to have a good look at the video but we don’t think there was any contact made by either player.

“Hopefully we can overturn it. I think they had words and squared up but I think that’s as far as it got.”

Davies had replaced Nicky Forster, who limped out of his first pre-season start with suspected recurrence of the knee problem which required surgery at the end of May.

Slade said: “That knee is obviously causing him some aggravation. He seemed to be limping towards the end of his 60 minutes and we are going to have to look at that seriously.”

Crawley trialist Jake Wright, already the subject of bids from Charlton and Colchester, impressed on his debut as Albion lost to a first half goal by Torquay's new signing Scott Rendell.

“I thought he did very well,” Slade said. “He was very comfortable and he’s very genuine, a talker who wants to do well. I liked his approach to everything. He has spent most of his time at centre half but he didn’t look out of place at left-back.”