Rangers: Alfredo Morelos challenged to turn scoring records into trophies

30th Oct 2020 | Source: BBC

Steven Gerrard was delighted for Alfredo Morelos

Alfredo Morelos "deserves" to equal Ally McCoist's European scoring record, says Steven Gerrard, who challenged him to win trophies like his predecessor.

Morelos had been left on the bench for a second game running but came on to score the only goal in a Europa League Group D win over Lech Poznan at Ibrox.

It was the Colombian's 21st for Rangers in European competition.

"Ally's a legend of the club, he has been here and done it, got the T-shirt," manager Gerrard said.

"The challenge for Alfredo is: can he build on all his goals and help his team to become successful come the end of the season?"

It was a first goal in seven games for the 24-year-old, who was not in the starting XI in the weekend win over Livingston and saw Kemar Roofe come in to start ahead of him as Jermain Defoe dropped out the starting line-up.

"It's fantastic for him from a personal point of view," Gerrard said of his record-equalling feat. "He has scored some real big important goals in Europe for us, so I'm very pleased for Alfredo.

"Hopefully that will be the catalyst for Alfredo to go on and score some more goals for us."

While Poznan offered a threat and ambition going forward, Rangers recorded a fifth consecutive clean sheet to sit level on six points with Benfica after two games in Group D.

"I'm happy with the performance," Gerrard added. "I thought it was strong, professional, controlled.

"At half-time, we were really happy with a lot of the play, but we wanted a bit more in the final third, that bit of magic, quality to find a breakthrough. We told them to believe in themselves a bit more. It's a fantastic win for us - the goal was fantastic - the cross was top, top class."
Morelos' road to European record

2018

26 Jul: Osijek (away)

9 Aug: Maribor (home)

4 Oct: Rapid Vienna (home) 2

2019

9 Jul: St Joseph's (away)

18 Jul: St Joseph's (home) 3

8 Aug: Midtjylland (away)

15 Aug: Midtjylland (home) 2

22 Aug: Legia Warsaw (home)

3 Oct: Young boys (away)

24 Oct: Porto (away)