Hearts unable to appeal Malaury Martin's yellow card as rules are not in place at SFA

Hearts have revealed the club are unable to appeal a yellow card shown to Malaury Martin in Saturday's 3-0 victory at Motherwell.

Referee Andrew Dallas booked the Hearts midfielder after awarding a free-kick to the home side, when Louis Moult was actually tripped by his Motherwell team-mate Lionel Ainsworth.

Hearts were confident the card would be rescinded, but it has emerged the Scottish FA's rules do not allow for this.

The Tynecastle club are now seeking a rule change "so that common sense can prevail in the future and no other player or club suffers a similar fate."

A statement from Hearts read: "The club had intended to appeal the weekend booking of Malaury Martin, who was yellow carded by Andrew Dallas against Motherwell, and indicated an intention to do so on the grounds of "Mistaken Identity". (i.e. The Referee wrongly identified the player who committed the foul.)

"Following discussions with the club's legal advisors and various officials at the SFA, it is clear however that the current rules as they stand, do not cover this specific situation.

"Put quite simply, we cannot appeal on the grounds of "Mistaken Identity" as the referee did not mistakenly identify our player. He believed the offence was committed by Malaury.

"The fact that it was not a foul and that the Motherwell player merely tripped over the feet of his own player, means that while it may have been an error to give the foul and to book our player, it was not a case of mistaken identity.

"The Referee did not mistake Malaury for another Hearts player, which is the only situation that would allow an appeal to be successful in the case of "Mistaken Identity". Nor can the yellow be rescinded by referee Dallas as the rules do not allow for this. N.B. Yellow cards can only be appealed in Scotland on two grounds, "simulation" and "mistaken identity"

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