RICARDO Santos has been cleared to play against Wigan Athletic tonight after the Football Assocation overturned his red card against Blackpool.

The centre-half was sent off on Saturday at Bloomfield Road by referee Josh Smith for a challenge on Kyle Joseph, which also resulted in a penalty to the home side.

The ‘double jeopardy’ rule states that a yellow card and a penalty award is sufficient if it is deemed the player made a genuine attempt to play the ball.

The FA’s disciplinary committee has now confirmed that Santos has avoided a two-game ban and the card has been rescinded.

“Ricardo Santos will be available for Bolton Wanderers FC’s next two fixtures following a successful claim of wrongful dismissal,” a statement read.

“The defender was sent off for denying an obvious goalscoring opportunity during the EFL League One fixture against Blackpol on Saturday, February 24.”

Wanderers have had several red cards overturned in recent seasons, including one for Santos after an incident at Morecambe in February 2022.

Evatt was confident the FA would reach a positive outcome when he spoke to the local press on Monday afternoon.

“You can never guarantee anything in this game but it comes down to a point of law, it isn’t a point of view,” he said. “Over the weekend I had some good conversations with the PGMOL and we both agreed that we had been hard done by on a couple of occasions of late.

“But from our point of view, we can’t control refereeing decisions, we can only make sure we react the right way and concentrate on our own performances. I don’t think we did that well enough at Blackpool, so we will be looking to do much better on Tuesday night at Wigan.”

Full-time referee Smith is not in action tonight but will take the field again in the Championship on Saturday, where he will preside over Plymouth Argyle v Ipswich Town.

Smith has also refereed in the Premier League this season.