The Rangers evolution of Alfredo Morelos

There was the quality of service from wide right by James Tavernier, the timing of Morelos’ run and, of course, the headed finish from inside the six-yard box. In many ways, it was a throwback to the Colombian’s first season as a Rangers player.

However, during his four years at Ibrox, Morelos has scored many different types of goals. While his style of play has remained roughly the same in that time, there have been subtle trends that reflect his evolving role for the team.

Here, we chart Morelos' evolution as a Rangers striker through a combination of data and video analysis.

2017-18 - The debut season

Three days after Morelos signed for Rangers in the summer of 2017, Eduardo Herrera was brought in.

With greater experience, caps for Mexico and a previous working relationship with manager Pedro Caixinha, he was expected to lead the line. But Morelos made an immediate impact, while Herrera struggled to adapt.

The youngster’s ability in front of goal was also clear to team-mates in training.

“It was the first thing I noticed,” Lee Wallace told Rangers TV. “We were doing a small 2-v-1 transition drill in his first session so there were a lot of quick-fire shots at different angles and speeds. Every single shot was back of the net: corners, top corners.”

Morelos scored 14 league goals in his debut season, and 28.6 per cent of them were with his head. Exactly half of his total came from some sort of cross - low and driven, cut-backs, or high balls.

Morelos would never again in one season get such a large percentage of his goals from crosses and headers, underlining the change to a more rounded attacking style under Steven Gerrard.

The first league goal Morelos ever scored for Rangers had similarities to his most recent one - it was a header from inside the six-yard box off a cross from the right. This was how many of his goals came in 2017-18, with good deliveries coming from Tavernier or Daniel Candeias.

Half of Morelos’ 14 league goals were the opener for Rangers in a match.

At this moment, he was by far the team’s most important attacker, with huge responsibility when it came to breaking down opponents.

He was an opportunist, scoring with first-time finishes on the ground or in the air, but he showed some moments of real individual quality to work openings for himself too.

2018-19 - The best

Steven Gerrard’s arrival in 2018-19 helped to take Morelos to another level, though the qualities that Gerrard tapped into - the striker’s work-rate and link play - were already on show.

These attributes would become crucial as Rangers moved to more intense pressing and a more rounded attacking game.

Morelos scored his first league goal of the campaign against St Mirren in August, finishing on a through ball by Jamie Murphy. The move stemmed from Rangers pressing and forcing a high turnover, emphasising a key element of Gerrard’s approach and Morelos’ importance to it.

This was probably Morelos’ best season in a Rangers jersey. He was Premiership top scorer with 18 goals. He converted 16.7 per cent of his shots into goals - his highest conversion rate while at Ibrox. He scored in 16 different games, more than in any other season. He enjoyed his longest scoring streak, finding the net in seven consecutive games. 

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He also scored his one and only league goal from outside the penalty box, in a 4-2 win over Aberdeen. The fact this goal also involved some brilliant movement to withdraw away from the defensive line, and a sublime finish with his weaker left foot, highlighted just how well Morelos was playing.

Morelos was pivotal to Rangers, scoring 22 per cent of the team’s 82 goals. At just 22 years of age, he was starting to attract interest from clubs across Europe for his goal-scoring and all-round play.

2019-20 - European breakout

Morelos opened his account for the 2019-20 season in a 6-1 win over Hibs with a superb solo goal. Single-handedly leading a counter-attack, he raced past two defenders before holding off a third and firing underneath the goalkeeper. He was full of confidence, and proved himself just as dangerous a counter-attacking threat in Europe.

After a headed winner to help Rangers past Legia Warsaw and into the group stages, Morelos scored six goals in six group games. He scored twice against Young Boys, twice against Feyenoord, and twice against Porto, with the stand-out a well-taken volley to open the scoring in a 2-0 home win over the Portuguese giants.

Morelos scored 12 goals in a shortened Premiership campaign, four of which involved three+ touches before finishing. This highlighted how he had gone from opportunist to shot-maker over the course of his first three years at Ibrox. But his good form didn’t last all season.

In late 2019, Morelos was unplayable. However, by the time 2020 came around he was struggling to find the net, enduring his worst Premiership drought of nine games without a goal. His conversion percentage dipped to its lowest, as he scored with just 11.1% of his shots.

Off-field incidents, injuries and suspensions hadn’t helped, but Morelos had lost some of the confidence that made him such a consistent goal-getter in his first two-and-a-half years in Scotland.

2020-21 - Back to finishing

The main lesson from the end to the previous season was that Rangers couldn’t rely on Morelos for goals anymore. With Jermain Defoe entering his late-30s, they had to spread the scoring risk. Ianis Hagi’s loan move was made permanent, while Kemar Roofe and Cedric Itten were also brought in to add firepower.

Morelos was no longer the main man up front. When it came to breaking opponents down, Roofe took his place, opening the scoring in six league games to Morelos’ five. Furthermore, the percentage of Rangers’ total goals scored by Morelos dropped to a record low of 13 per cent.

In a way, this was a positive. Morelos could still contribute in pressing and link play, he was still scoring goals, and his conversion percentage rose back to a more normal 16.4 per cent. The only change was that now he had equals in the goal-scoring department.

Rangers of 2020-21 were unbeatable in the league, and they peaked in their team attacking play. Whereas before Morelos worked a lot of goals for himself, now he was reverting back to getting on the end of things with one- and two-touch finishes.

Just 8.3 per cent of his 12 goals came after three touches or more, compared to 33.3, 22.2 and 14.2 per cent in previous seasons. Also, a third of those goals came from inside the six-yard box.

With help from Roofe and an improving Ryan Kent, not to mention an increasingly slick passing game implemented by Gerrard, Morelos was able to get on the end of some brilliant team moves. He also broke his duck in Old Firm derbies, fittingly skinning arch-rival Scott Brown in the lead-up to one of them.

As Rangers became a well-oiled machine, Morelos was no longer the star. Finally, there was a team around him that at least matched his individual performance levels. Rangers could score without him, though he remained an integral piece of the puzzle in Gerrard’s 4-3-3 system. 

2021-22 - The season so far

While Morelos has now surpassed the 100-goal mark, his fifth season as a Rangers player hasn’t been easy. He hasn’t looked quite as ruthless in front of goal, and the stats bear this out. His conversion percentage of 8.8 is lower than in any of his first four seasons.

Gerrard has spoken about the need for the striker to recapture his best form. “We have to keep providing the service and the chances for Alfredo to get more goals,” the manager said. “But if you look at previous number nines and also Alfredo’s record in other seasons, it has been better.”

Still, history tells us that Morelos bounces back. His trajectory hasn’t been linear; there have been peaks and troughs, tweaks to his role and changes in his scoring patterns over the years.

He went from a penalty-box finisher thriving on crosses to a pressing leader under Gerrard, developed into a striker capable of working his own shots, then reverted back to a finisher in a more complete team last season.