Steven Gerrard and Alfredo Morelos have slightly different memories of the journey, but reaching the promised land of a league title was always their shared ambition. Last week, the striker said he’d had some “difficulties” with his manager but that they “have fixed it”, whereas Gerrard insists he has “loved every minute working with” the 24-year-old Colombian.
The divergence in these takes is probably just a case of what tough love looks like depending on whether you are issuing or receiving it. Either way, Morelos has played a full part in Rangers’ championship success, broadening the range of influence he brings to bear on games while not allowing himself to be caught up in so many senseless sideshows.
There have still been glimpses of the Colombian’s previous wild indiscipline — he missed three matches after a forearm smash on Dundee United’s Mark Connolly, and again for a stamp on Ryan Porteous, of Hibernian — but Morelos cuts a much more content, and compelling, figure these days.
“The person who deserves the credit for transforming himself is Alfredo, not me,” says Gerrard. “He did an interview recently talking about the difficulties we’ve had — I’m not aware of them because it’s not been a difficulty for me.
“I’ve said he’s been a challenge because he hasn’t always been perfect, but he’s been an absolute pleasure to work with. He’s smiling and it’s probably the happiest I’ve seen him over the course of three years. He’s really proud to be a champion and a league winner here, and hopefully it’s given him the hunger to go and achieve many more things with the team.
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“I suppose some of the things I have imposed on him, in terms of fines, suspensions and certain things I have made him do to get him in better physical shape have been quite difficult for him, but they haven’t been for me.
“I treat all the players the same. There’s a certain standard that every player has to abide by. If you don’t abide by it, you’re probably not going to like what’s coming your way. I can understand with the interview where he’s coming from but, in terms of the relationship, I’ve never had a difficult day because I’ve loved every minute of working with him. I still do and I hope he stays around for a long time.”
In the same conversation with Colombia’s Win Sports channel, Morelos addressed the racist abuse he has suffered in Scotland. The subject is high on the Ibrox agenda just now after Glen Kamara reported having received sick taunts from Ondrej Kudela of Slavia Prague in a recent Europa League game, while teammate Kemar Roofe has been subjected to sustained abuse on social media.
Gerrard believes the football authorities and leading social media platforms are still not taking a strong enough line on racial harassment. “We support all the players in the best way we can. We’re there for all of them,” says the manager. “We have suffered as a club in terms of the individuals. Alfredo has suffered for some time, which is not fair, it’s not right.
“We want to be there and be the biggest support we can be. It has got to stop. It’s really frustrating that the people in powerful positions are not doing all they can. We as a club are. We’re doing everything we can. We are giving it a lot of time and attention now to try and help.
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“We’re being the best support we can for our players but it’s really frustrating that the people that can make a bigger difference, and the main difference, are not really listening at the moment.”
Rangers welcome Hibs to Ibrox this afternoon, with Gerrard insisting there will be no slackening of the standards that have seen his men win 28 and draw five of their 33 Premiership fixtures to date, conceding only ten goals in the process.
Today’s third-placed visitors represent one of the last significant obstacles between Rangers and an unbeaten league season, and Gerrard’s charges will also be playing for places in the Scottish Cup fourth-round match at home to Celtic on Saturday.
“We’re really looking forward to lifting the trophy come the end of the season, but there are still challenges from a league point of view that we want to continue,” Gerrard says. “There’s staying unbeaten, clean sheet records, and players individually are competing for [the various] player of the year [awards]. There are goal targets for individual players, still a lot of things that we want to play for and finish the league campaign as strongly as we can.
“The last thing players want to do is put in a poor or complacent individual performance for the team. If you do that, your place in the team could be in jeopardy when I come to pick a side for the cup game. This game in front of us against Hibs is very important. We still have a lot of targets that individually and collectively we want to achieve in the league from now until May 15.
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“Team selection goes off what happens in training and what happens in the next game. If people lose their focus against Hibs and don’t do themselves justice, they could leave themselves vulnerable to losing out on team selection in six days’ time.”
Gerrard expressed satisfaction that Leon Balogun, the centre back, has signed a one-year contract extension, having triggered an appearance clause in the deal he agreed when joining from Brighton last summer.
The Nigerian was recruited to help cover the absence of Nikola Katic, whose anterior cruciate ligament injury has kept him out all season. Gerrard expects the Croat to make his return in pre-season.
“If things progress well from now till then, Niko will come in for pre- season and hopefully start building up to getting as fit as he can to be available as soon as he can. It’s an injury that you have to be really patient with. It’s a career-threatening injury. We all know that when it comes down to knee injuries that are six to nine months, you have to be careful. There’s no cutting corners.
“You have to listen to the specialists, take it step by step, and there are still a lot of hurdles for Niko to get over. He’s been on the pitch starting to jog, which is a big step forward, and we now have to see how the knee reacts to being loaded at 100 per cent. He’s been running on a machine that takes some of the load off.
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“At the moment there are still hurdles and things to tick in the short term, but the dream and the plan for us is to have Niko available for pre- season training.”
On TV Today
Rangers v Hibernian
Rangers TV. Kick-off 3pm
