Should Rangers drop this off-form star?

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Should Rangers drop this off-form star?


Only two months ago Rangers fans, your Ibrox Noise crew included, were singing the praises of sensational summer signing Alfredo Morelos.

When linked with him, we cited him as the potential Rangers answer to Moussa Dembele – an unheralded forward that could be a hidden gem. And when he went on that hot streak in August to mid-September, we really thought we had hit the jackpot.

A tiger of a striker, and a tank of a man, scoring goals for fun. He was on fire, and English sides were suddenly in for him – threats of a January sale loomed given his increasing value to Rangers, and fans prayed we could hold onto the guy a little longer.

Fast forward to 19th of November – as horrible as it is to say, Morelos is growing into a dreadful flop.

The guy does not lack industry, heart, or effort, but when we really look at the guy’s stats, we begin to wonder how he managed a hot streak at all, rather than wondering why he has gone cold.

Morelos has managed 18 appearances at Ibrox – he has only scored in 5 matches.

Some perspective please gentlemen and ladies – yes, in three of those matches he scored two goals (one of those being in the league cup, incidentally), but the harsh reality is he has failed to deliver in 13 of 18, and by any stretch of the imagination, that is dreadful.

We do like the lad – albeit, not so much the pathetic play-acting which blighted him not that long ago, but his graft, persistence and endeavour are admirable. And we like those who fight for the shirt.

But sorry guys, he is here to score goals. We do not need two Kenny Millers up front – we do not need two hard working grafters with a lack of cutting edge. Morelos was brought in because of his brilliant record in Finland; and that record is starting to look meaningless.

The Colombian has not scored in nine matches. That is an acceptable drought, but not at the level of the SPL. Even Motherwell’s recently-barren Louis Moult scored a double at Pittodrie yesterday, but for love nor money Morelos is just drawing a blank after blank.

It is time to give the lad a rest. He is low on confidence, and every passing match he does not score hits that even more.

Rangers have a number of attacking options; Eduardo Herrera was actually coming onto a bit of a game earlier in the season, and Ryan Hardie has never been given anything like a real chance at this club.

But whatever the manager (whoever that is) decides, it is surely time to give Morelos a breather.

Players should be dropped when their form is poor – and at a club like Rangers, there should always be another option when the primary one is not delivering.

If Bruno Alves can lose his place, anyone can.

NB: we do admire Morelos’ ethic, and his commitment. This article is not meant to be a hate fest, albeit we know the usual suspects will accuse us of being anti-Rangers. Far from it. We want the best players, and the in-form players playing for us. Right now, that is not Alfredo Morelos. If Pena can be ditched for being completely ineffective, why does Morelos get away with it?

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17 COMMENTS

  1. Really.
    He's only 21 just joined a massive club and he's learning to speak English.
    With all the unrest that's been going on of a late the poor boy doesn't know if hes needing a shite or a haircut!!

    The boy runs and fights for absolutely everything normally all on his own up there.

    I think our support are being harsh as fuk on one so young.
    Big deal he's off peak the now, he probably needs a rest he put a pre-season in Finland during February & March and hasnt had a rest since. I wish we had another just like him.

    Moult & Morelos will destroy every defence in the SPL

  2. I think he was easily one of our best players yesterday, he was really unlucky not to score. I think he's a great player and is only going to get better. Once he scores again I don't think he'll stop.

  3. I agree he is not delivering, but what about playing him with a strike partner to see if that changes anything?
    Try him with Herrera, or even Hardie. Anybody but drop deep Kenny
    I like Miller and appreciate his loyalty to the cause, but he is not our best midfield option and right now he is not delivering up front

  4. Slightly off topic but if the EastEnders sign Moult in January then it is another boot in the balls for us.
    We need to get in to the other teams faces and destroy them.
    Players like Moult do that. Players like Windass do not.
    Moult should be our number one priority today, not January. And no matter what the competition is for his signature we must sign him .
    Moult and Morelos could be an excellent pair. Should have been a done deal already.

  5. Having rewatched yesterday's game again, there is no way the word "flop" can be applied to El Buffalo. He is easily the best signing we've made this summer, hands down. He works like a Trojan, batters his way (alone) up front and frightens the living crap out of defenders. We were much the poorer when he went off yesterday. If he had a strike partner, as stated above, he would be banging them in. At the moment the only player supporting this 21 year old is the 23 year old Windass, the player that 99% of fans seem to hate and blame for every ill at Ibrox. Windass was perhaps the only creative source we had yesterday. He ran into the ground, created chance after chance and with Candeias having one of his quieter games, he was the only source of supply for Morelos.
    Not only do we have one up, with Miller off wandering, but even our midfield pair of Holt and Jack are defensive minded holding midfielders. Against a team (like most) that will come to Ibrox to defend and hit on the break, we should be playing bloody 4-2-4 and getting any attack-minded players on the ball.
    We were desperately unlucky yesterday and some of the stuff I've seen on social media has been world-ending nonsense.
    I maintain this is not a bad set of players; they need a manager who is going to come in and sort them out. Tell them what's what and exactly what he wants- not be divisive like Ped, not be chummy like Murty (only five years old than Kenny, ffs!).
    Play players in their favoured positions (Hodson at LB? Come on, man) and give them some bloody belief.
    If I was a Rangers player and saw some of the crap written about me, by FANS, I would be struggling for confidence too- so so quick to jump on their backs.

    I don't care who the next manager is, he and the players need our 100% backing, not constant sniping and as for this "Rangers quality" bullshit- wake up and smell the coffee. We aren't in the races any more- players over the border, average players, go for millions and millions of pounds. We need to get young, hungry, skilful players and rebuild our legacy.

    Apart from Miller and Candeias, I think all the players on the pitch yesterday were 27 or under. Wilson is 25, Holt is 24, Jack is 25, McRorie 19, Windass 23, Morelos 21…. Miller is not the man to lead these lads on the pitch, we need someone to pick them up by the balls and tell them they have skill.
    I hoped it would be Dorrans or Alves, but for whatever reason, things have not clicked there.
    I still believe we are not far off being an effective team and I hope the new manager has the belief in the players they need.

    Rant over! 🙂

  6. Just looked at the title there n nothing else. Who wud take his place is my question cud sum one do any better?? No.

  7. Agree with the main points in all the above articles and would further add the quality of some of the balls he does receive especially from left side are often far to heavy and difficult to control whereas some subtle passes would not go amiss and am i the only one who thinks it was back to the breadman era and how often do we get free kicks inside the opposition half and the ball ends up back at our goalkeeper (please dont reply its ball retention).

    • It's not ball retention Jim. It is a group of players with no confidence and giving way too much respect to opposing teams.
      Motherwell don't have this problem.

  8. Glad to see the backing young Morelos has from decent Rangers fans. I remember a young McCoist going through a similar lean spell, no I am not comparing Morelos to Ally, but McCoist when asked about missing chances his reply was ‘I am getting into the right position to miss the chances, I will start to worry when I don’t’.
    All that has been said here I can’t disagree with, there were other players worse than he was. What we need to look at about yesterday’s performance, in my opinion, is that on any other day with the chances we created throughout the whole game we would have won by scoring 3, 4, ,5 or more goals. We had at least six scoring opportunities from open play, two efforts of the crossbar, the keeper had four good saves and at least three goal line clearances. So was it such a terrible performance? Hamilton were gifted the first goal, lost the second on a counter-attack, yet we still had chances to salvage the game.
    Maybe Moreles could be placed on the subs bench for the next game, with 30 mins bringing him on, but there were others worse than him and let’s gate a number 10 on the field playing closer to him to give him some well earned support.

  9. I agree with most comments today I think he does need a rest and we need to look at the shape of the team , if we play with two wingers , Windass an Candillas we have to have a target or 2 in the box I like the laddie a lot and he will come good but he looks fed up sometimes and gets frustrated . On the Management front I have been saying all along that McLeish should be our man to get us stable and being Rangers again

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