MARK Hughes may have to go bargain hunting in the January sales to stop Blackburn Rovers' season from going off the rails.

It's not so long ago that Hughes hailed this squad as the strongest he has ever worked with, but he may consider revising that opinion after Coventry City ruthlessly exposed the flaws in his supporting cast.

The warning signs have been there for some time, although a haul of seven points from nine over Christmas temporarily masked some deeper, underlying problems.

But on Saturday, in the full glare of a shell-shocked Ewood crowd, all of Rovers' recent failings were brutally laid bare by a Maltese striker, whose nickname is the Mosquito', and an ageing journeyman who failed to make the grade at Burnley.

Without question, this was the nadir of Hughes' three-year spell in charge.

Embarrassed and humiliated in front of their own supporters, Rovers were booed during and after this tame surrender to a Coventry side that is languishing in the lower reaches of the Championship.

For a club with Rovers' proud history in this competition, the second half performance was simply unacceptable - a point Hughes forcefully rammed home when he launched into a furious post-match tirade.

Seething at what he perceived to be a lack of effort and application in certain quarters, Hughes gave his players a famous blast of the Fergie hairdryer' as he spelled out a few uncomfortable home truths to certain individuals.

Even accounting for the absences of Roque Santa Cruz, David Dunn, Steven Reid and Jason Roberts, all of whom were unavailable due to injury, a Rovers team containing David Bentley, Tugay and Benni McCarthy should still have had more than enough quality to see off Coventry's challenge.

Instead, they came up woefully short, after yet another inept defensive display that was symptomatic of recent per-formances.

There was an element of the Keystone Cops about the way Rovers defended at times, not least for the third goal, when Ryan Nelsen and Morten Gamst Pedersen collided with each other, leaving Dele Adebola with an open invitation to shoot past Brad Friedel.

In fact, Adebola, a big lump of a centre forward, was made to look more like Pele than Dele as he slalomed his way through Rovers' flimsy rearguard.

If that was calamitous then so, too, was Zurab Khizanishvili's assault on Leon Best that led to a penalty and City's killer second goal, clinically dispatched by Elliott Ward.

A team normally respected for its steely resolve has suddenly developed a soft underbelly.

There are various reasons why the wheels are threatening to come off Rovers' bandwagon.

The inability to keep a clean sheet - there has been just two in the last 19 games - lies at the heart of Rovers' problems, and until Hughes solves that particular conundrum, results will prove hard to come by.

Secondly, the spirit within the camp does not feel quite as harmonious as it perhaps was earlier in the campaign.

The situations regarding Robbie Savage and Jason Roberts - both of whom have made it clear they want out - appears to have had an unsettling effect on the dressing room.

On top of that, Benni McCarthy, who was such a talismanic force last season, bears the look of a man whose head is somewhere else.

One shot, fired straight at goalkeeper Dimi Konstantopoulos in the first half, was about the height of his contribution, which is nowhere near good enough for a player of his calibre.

This was also a chance for some of the players on the fringes of the first team to stake a claim for more regular inclusion, but they blew it.

Making his first domestic start since a £350,000 move from NAC Breda last summer, Maceo Rigters was a major disappointment up front, regularly getting brushed off the ball all too easily by Coventry's Elliott Ward and his defensive sentries.

And Keith Treacy, an exciting prospect from the club's Academy, froze on his full debut, demonstrating little of the raw potential he has frequently shown for the reserves.

However, with practically everyone else around him floundering, it was always going to be difficult for the Irishman to shine so, hopefully, his time will come again soon.

Unless you are Arsene Wenger, Avram Grant or Sir Alex Ferguson, it's always a calculated risk when you rest key players, which is why Hughes has resisted the temptation to field weakened sides in cup competitions in the past.

But on this occasion, he believed he had enough strength in depth to cope and went against his better judgement, deciding to start with Nelsen, Pedersen and Stephen Warnock on the bench, a move that ultimately back-fired.

Some of the substitutions merely added to the confusion: at one point in the second half, there was a centre half playing at centre forward; a left-back playing at right-back; and a left-winger operating at full-back.

It was most unlike Hughes, who normally favours round pegs in round holes.

Trying to make sense of the chaos, the Rovers boss said: "You make changes because you want to affect the game in a positive way and unfortunately, as we were making them, Brett Emerton then came over and told us he had a hamstring injury, so that compromised what we were initially going to do.

"We had to reorganise and, from that point onwards, we never really had control of the game, and we were always open and liable to be caught on the break."

A season that promised so much is now in danger of fizzling out, unless Hughes can inject some fresh impetus during the window.

Aside from the prestige and the feel-good factor that a cup run always generates, an early exit from the FA Cup is also a major financial blow for a club of Rovers' size.

Last season's march to the semi-finals, when Rovers were a hair's bredth from Wembley, boosted the coffers by £2 million, which roughly equates to an extra player in the transfer window.

Not only that, a run in the cup also provides the squad with extra focus during the closing months of the season, when aching limbs and tired minds make it tempting to switch into holiday mode.

Instead, Rovers now face a straight slog to the Premier League finishing line, without any major distractions en route.

They have 17 games left to salvage something from the season. It's time to show some character.