Refereeing in the Scottish Premiership has come under a lot of scanner in recent times. Almost at the end of every game, we see teams launching an official appeal against the SFA, and a lot of conspiracy theories go around with the fans of both Glaswegian giants feeling hard done.
With Rangers, one player has always been the darling (insert eye roll here) of the referees and that is Alfredo Morelos. The Colombian is having a fantastic season for the Gers as he has already managed 28 goals in all competitions but there is another piece of stat which showcases his other side of the game.
The forward has received a whopping 13 yellow cards and four red cards. Those are some atrocious number of bookings for a player who isn’t involved much in defending.
Gerrard tried to make sense on why he plays in that way as he was quoted as saying (After the derby win at Ibrox last year), ”A lot of things go unnoticed on Alfredo Morelos. He is a marked man because players don’t like playing against him and players target him. He has to put up with an awful lot. The kid is young, he is trying to learn and grow, he is trying to protect himself. He is only doing what any young striker would try to do when he is targeted. There is no doubt he is targeted, because he is a super talent.”
Now it’s true that the opposition defenders try to get under his skin and it is clear that they look for a response from Morelos. One doesn’t need to look too far off for examples as Morelos and Scott McKenna were recently involved in an altercation where both of them were shown the marching orders. To save his skin after he left a bit too much on McKenna, Morelos started to roll over holding his face. Acts like that don’t really help his cause as the referees around the league would have seen that.
A player like Morelos thrives on these altercations. He is often seen contesting smallest of the decision with the referees and this too doesn’t play in his hand. Now you don’t need to make yourself likeable to the referees but it always makes sense to have them on the right side by not getting into too many arguments with them.
There is no doubt that the forward is himself to be blamed for his situation and sometimes he doesn’t get decisions in his favour because of his image. There isn’t a game which goes by where Morelos doesn’t leave something extra on the defenders and in an actual match, the referees might miss it. However, in the age of television and replays, they must see it later on and they might form some preconceived notions which at the end of the day comes in because they are also human beings.
