BLACKBURN Rovers lost vital ground in the battle for European places after Martin O'Neill's Aston Villa pulled off a smash and grab job at a shellshocked Ewood.

This was meant to be Rovers' game in hand on their closest rivals but, instead of closing the gap on the top-six, they slumped to their heaviest home defeat in the Premier League since they were beaten 4-0 by Middlesbrough on October 16 2004.

In fairness, the scoreline barely reflects the story of a bizarre night.

For half an hour, Villa were totally outplayed by a Rovers side playing with great attacking verve, but the visitors then got a lucky break when a wonderful strike from Benni McCarthy was wrongly chalked out for offside. It proved to be a pivotal moment.

From then on, Villa made the most of their good fortune, capitalising on sloppy defending to score from their first meaningful attack.

And any hope of a Rovers comeback was effectively extinguished early in the second half when Ryan Nelsen conceded a penalty and was harshly red-carded for a shirt-pull on Gabriel Agbonlahor.

After that, Villa ruthlessly exploited their numerical advantage but even their manager, Martin O'Neill, sportingly admitted the 4-0 scoreline flattered them afterwards.

As for Hughes and his players, they must write this off as a freak result.

"It's a great result for them and a poor one for us, but it's not one that's going to dent our confidence because we know we are still a good team," said Hughes.

"We've got a big game at the weekend and I feel there's a real determination amongst the players to get this result out of their system.

"Today, I just felt the game was taken out of our control on occasions."

Despite venting his anger at the officials, who made a number of baffling decisions during the course of the night, Hughes also admitted Rovers need to defend better than they did here.

Chris Samba and Nelsen, normally so commanding at the back, never looked entirely comfortable, and the manner in which the first goal was conceded was totally uncharacteristic of the team as a whole.

"You expect people to do their jobs at set-plays," said Hughes.

"He (John Carew) got an early run and Brad's position could have been better - it was a long way to come.

"We are disappointed with that because we had talked beforehand about making sure we did our jobs at set-plays and, obviously, they've scored from one of those situations.

"Villa are a big, strong side and they have that capacity to cause you a problem."

Before kick-off, Hughes had called on his players to test out Scott Carson at every opportunity, in the belief the Villa keeper might be suffering from a crisis of confidence following his nightmare performance for England last week.

A vociferous Rovers following also did their utmost to expose any weaknesses in Carson's psyche, booing his every touch during a lively start.

The Villa number one's first major test came in the ninth minute, and he looked far from convincing when attempting to repel a David Dunn pot-shot, the ball cannoning off his gloves and back into play, but a defender cleared the danger.

Sensing Carson's vulnerability, Nelsen unleashed a shot on the turn which the keeper dealt with better, and a surging run from Roque Santa Cruz ended with the Paraguayan blazing narrowly over the angle of post and bar.

The shots rained in from all angles and Rovers began to play with a swagger.

David Bentley fired in a free-kick from the edge of the area, which looked destined for the top corner until Carson thrust out his right hand and tipped it over for a corner.

Still Rovers kept pressing forward and their enterprise should have been rewarded with a breathtaking goal in the 20th minute.

After brilliantly shaking off his marker with a neat pirouette, Santa Cruz slipped a clever pass out to McCarthy, who was in acres of space on the left-hand corner of the area.

In a blur, the South African curled an exquisite shot beyond Carson and into the far top corner, only to see his strike ruled out by an offside flag.

It was a tight call but television replays clearly showed the striker was level with the last defender when the pass was played so the goal' should have stood.

To make matters worse, Villa then capitalised on that stroke of good fortune by fashioning the opening goal nine minutes later.

England starlet Ashley Young delivered an inswinging free-kick from the left and, incredibly, the 6ft 5in Carew found himself totally unmarked in the area.

Friedel ventured off his line but was beaten to the punch by the towering Norwegian, whose glancing header flew into an unguaraded net.

That set-back visibly knocked the stuffing out of Rovers and they might have slipped further behind had the speedy Agbonlahor been more clinical when left one-on-one with Friedel shortly before half-time.

After a pep-talk from Hughes, Rovers emerged for the second half with renewed vigour.

Wilfred Bouma superbly blocked one venomous McCarthy volley; then Gareth Barry hacked the ball over his own crossbar after the nervous Carson fumbled under pressure.

But, just as Rovers were threatening to build up a head of steam, the wheels came off.

Once again, the back four failed to deal with another free-kick into the area, and the ball ricocheted off Samba straight to Agbonlahor, who had got goal-side of Nelsen.

As the Villa striker tried to wriggle free, the eagle-eyed referee Mr Dowd spotted a shirt-pull from Nelsen and had no hesitation in pointing to the spot.

Even worse, Nelsen was promptly sent off - which was harsh - and as the Kiwi disappeared down the tunnel, Barry stepped forward to coolly convert the penalty.

Villa ruthlessly exploited their numerical advantage after that.

Young curled in number three from the edge of the area in the 81st minute.

Then substitute Marlon Harewood gave the scoreline a flattering look when he smashed a fourth past a cruelly exposed Friedel in the 89th minute.