BLACKBURN boss Graeme Souness today insisted Rovers are not a dirty team as he leapt to the defence of his players in the wake of a stinging attack from Gerard Houllier.

Liverpool boss Houllier branded Lucas Neill a coward after his tackle on Jamie Carragher left the England international nursing a broken leg.

And the furious Kop chief also pointed the finger at David Thompson, accusing the former Liverpool star of deliberately trying to 'do' one of his players during Saturday's heated encounter.

The Reds certainly paid a heavy price for their 3-1 victory as both Carragher and Milan Baros ended up with serious injuries following two separate incidents in a highly-charged contest.

Neill was sent off for a two-footed challenge on Carragher which left the England international facing six months on the sidelines.

And Baros also underwent an operation on a broken ankle sustained as a result of a second minute challenge from Markus Babbel.

However, Souness has tried to diffuse the situation by insisting none of his players deliberately set out to hurt anyone.

"There was one bad tackle from 28 players in the whole of the 90 minutes, even though two people ended up with bad injuries," said Souness.

"It wasn't a dirty game, it was a competitive game, before anyone starts trying to create a big thing out of it.

"I've seen the tackle on TV again and it looked like a sending off to me but it wasn't malicious."

Although Houllier quickly absolved Babbel of any blame for Baros's injury, he saw the incident involving Neill and Carragher differently.

"I said after the game it was a tackle that could have broken his leg -- and sadly that is what's happened," raged the Reds boss.

"To me it was a coward's challenge. I am gutted for Jamie.

"He won't be able to play for another six months but Neill will be playing again in three matches' time.

"It shows you the force of the tackle when a lad who is wearing shin pads still suffers a broken leg.

"I can imagine what Graeme Souness would have been saying about it if one of his players had their leg broken in a similar way.

"I did not like the way in which the game was played and it is a terrible shame.

"In fact I would have rather lost the game than lose two players to serious injuries."

Meanwhile, Houllier also lambasted Thompson, accusing the Blackburn midfielder of deliberately trying to strike Jon Arne Riise.

"I was very unhappy with what Thompson did to Riise. When it's a challenge or a tackle it's okay," whinged the Reds boss.

"But when a player tries to hit another when the referee isn't looking and the ball has gone then I get very angry and I think Graeme would too.

"Thompson doesn't need to do that. He is a good player and if he had kept his cool he could have caused more problems for us.

"He tried to 'do' Riise in front of me and even the fourth official saw it. We had words. I think he was inviting me out for dinner but I don't think I will be available. I am not going to tell you what Thompson said but it was nothing really abusive."

Thompson sensibly refused to get drawn into a war of words with his former boss but he did say: "Gerard said something to me in French and I said something in French back to him."

Rovers' Under 17s beat Derby County 3-0 at the weekend but the Under 19s went down 2-1 at Sunderland.