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Neil Warnock was ruing his side’s luck with referees after Luke Varney was the latest Whites player to see red for an elbow to Adam Smith on 48 minutes.

Chris Wood gave the Lions the decisive lead on 80 minutes, but Warnock insisted that Halsey had got it wrong in giving Varney his marching orders which left his side still without a Championship win since October 6.

He said: “I thought we were very short-changed. I thought we did all right in the circumstances – we tried to win the game. At half-time we changed it a bit and it lasted two minutes.

“The amount of effort that’s gone into the game and we’re talking about a refereeing decision – it’s scandalous.

“When you watch the sending-off again, we don’t have thousands of Millwall fans screaming at us. It’s not caught him where he’s holding when he’s gone down.

Bradford City were outgunned at home to a superior Exeter side on Saturday as the club’s injury crisis began to bite.

City’s hectic fixture list left the side looking exhausted for most of the match, and the makeshift back four struggled to cope with Exeter’s attacking threat.

Evergreen striker Jamie Cureton scored with an acrobatic effort on 43 minutes, followed by a provocative celebration in front of the Bradford City fans, for which he was not booked.

City did have chances and, after switching to 4-3-3 after half-time, looked dangerous – going close through a James Hanson header and a spectacular cross-come-shot from Nahki Wells.

But City’s attacking threat fizzled out as the match wore on, and Exeter’s Alan Gow was the star of the show, pulling the strings in midfield and always finding the right pass.

The loss leaves Bradford seventh, and Phil Parkinson expects an instant response against Plymouth on Tuesday.

He said: “When you have been beaten you want another game to come quickly and we will be ready for Plymouth.”

Huddersfield Town suffered a defeat at home to Gus Poyet’s Brigton.

The only Brighton had two regular defenders ruled out and goalkeeper Tomasz Kuszczak injured a hand in the pre-match warm-up.

Will Buckley tucked away a fifth-minute opener for Brighton and made it 2-0 in the 40th when he raced through the middle.

Town forced nine second-half corners but had to be content with a 90th-minute tap-in from Simon Church.

Striker Alan Lee bemoaned Town’s lack of luck with refereeing decisions.

He fumed: “I couldn’t understand what was happening out there. There were so many penalty shouts turned down.

“I have just watched them on a video and while sometimes from a corner you can understand a referee missing something because there is a lot to watch, here there have been a couple of balls floated into me and the centre-halves made absolutely no effort but to hold me or push me away.

“It’s as clear as day and on anther occasion the fella has just stepped away and elbowed me across the back of my throat.