Swansea manager Russell Martin says the club will make a decision over whether to appeal against Joel Piroe’s red card following their 4-0 Championship defeat at Burnley.

Piroe appeared to stamp on Josh Cullen after the Burnley man fell to the ground and tugged at the Swans striker.

Martin says the player has pleaded his innocence and confirmed that the club would study the video to determine whether they can contest the expected three-match ban, which currently means he would be absent for games against Reading, Cardiff and Bristol City.

Martin said: “I haven’t seen it back enough yet. He told us he hasn’t meant to do it, that he tried to get out of the lad’s way and we have to trust Joel on that because he is such an honest, brilliant lad.

“We will have to have a look to see if we can appeal it because I trust Joel and trust what he tells us.

“It depends on how it looks on the pitch, but I was surprised a red card came out, really surprised having been in there and watched it.”

The dismissal put the cap on a miserable day for the Swans as their four-match winning streak ended, with Burnley moving top of the table ahead of Norwich’s evening kick-off.

First-half goals from Vitinho, Jay Rodriguez and Anass Zaroury – his first for the club – had the Clarets in control, and Rodriguez fired in his second after 57 minutes to complete the rout.

Defeat ended a good run for the Swans and Martin said the blame lay with him.

He added: “It hurts. We started the game really well and to go in 3-0 down at half-time is ridiculous from five shots.

“We started the second half brilliantly with two chances we didn’t take and got punished. It was a tough, tough day for us, the worst we have had this season.

“Their four goals summed our performance up – a mistake, lack of application, not taking responsibility.

“I had an idea in my mind of how we wanted to come here and adapt a couple of bits but when you’re not winning, it’s difficult.”

Burnley manager Vincent Kompany was pleased he could make the supporters happy with the comfortable win.

He said: “The performance was good and filled with energy. One of the things I put forward as much as the result is to give the fans something to be happy about.

“We played against a completely different opponent and that’s the beauty of this league – we had Coventry last weekend or Stoke and they were completely different games.

“We have an attacking threat on the pitch, always. If you look at our starting 11, I could pick a lot of players whose mindset is attacking.

“It’s important when these guys perform well that we have had good performances from other players in the same position, and that’s what I am after.

“I am glad but not over the top. We played really well, maybe we can be more dominant but my key concern in every game is to be threatening and we were threatening without the ball and threatening with it as well.

“The team is a work in progress, a lot of young players with room for improvement.”