IAN Evatt has put his full backing behind Ricardo Santos after it emerged the defender and his family have been targeted by vile online abuse.

The Bolton boss – who also revealed his own 12-year-old son has been targeted – has appealed for calm after the club were made aware of several messages posted on social media and sent directly to the player’s family since Saturday’s 2-0 win at Crawley.

Santos, who travelled with the squad for the game at Northampton Town, is understood to be upset at the level of personal abuse he has received since the play-off final at Wembley in May.

Many onlookers flagged up the fact he did not join in with goal celebrations, nor join his team-mates to applaud the supporters after recent games against Reading, Arsenal and Crawley.

Evatt said he would stand by the centre-back, who has featured in more games for him than any other player during his four years in charge.

“Ricardo has proven to me, personally, and to this football club over a considerable time now how much he wants to be here,” he told The Bolton News. “He is dedicated.

“His performance at Crawley on Saturday was probably his best of the season, in my opinion, and what has happened since then isn’t good for anyone.

“Rico has my full backing and my full belief. I just think at times this season he has been the one who has been targeted the most, he has taken criticism which has gone beyond critique. It has been personal to him and his family and people have been affected by that.

“All I will say is he loves playing for this club, he loves the fanbase, and his dedication shouldn’t be based on whether he claps at the end of a game, it should be how he performs. I thought on Saturday he was magnificent.

“If we are talking about this stuff after a win then it should be a red flag. We don’t want this to spill over. We want to stick together and move forwards up this division. I genuinely believe we all want the same thing, or the vast majority want the same thing, so let’s support each other.

“The players and myself need to give more of what we have in the last couple of games, which have been different types of performances, but we need the support of the fans because without it we can’t do what we need to do.”

Evatt is concerned at the rise in online abuse aimed towards footballers – both at his own club and elsewhere – which has been highlighted in a recent report from the PFA.

The Wanderers boss came under fire after Wembley, with the frustration rising again around the fanbase when the club made a slow start to the season, losing three consecutive league games against Charlton, Exeter City and Huddersfield Town.

And though he accepts criticism was a natural product of poor results he feels social media has been a driver for a more personal and concerning level of abuse. He said: “I think football has been the biggest loser. I am not saying it is the only industry that suffers that type of thing because it isn’t.

“But I grew up a working class lad in football, I have been in the game my entire adult life. And since social media started this kind of thing has increased year on year.

“It was brought in to be a tool for communication and doing good, but it is a societal problem that has turned it the other way. For whatever reason, footballers and managers are seen as figures who belong to the public, so you can say anything you want at any given time without accountability.

“When it comes to football critique, we are all in this industry and we understand what it means. We know that when we don’t play well we will be criticised, when we don’t do our jobs properly in the fans’ perception we will get criticism, but when it spills over to – for example – my 12-year-old son, or family members, we need to take a good long look at ourselves and what we are saying and doing. People are affected and we shouldn’t wait for something serious to happen before we want change.

“The last thing I will say is that we care deeply about this club, nobody more than me, and we care about getting results for this fanbase. I want us to push forward together.

“It hasn’t been a smooth start but I have said many times in bad runs what defines you as a club and as a person is how you respond. We are trying to react in the right way by winning football matches and hopefully we can continue to do that this week.”