Morelos not certain of Gers start despite improvements – Gerrard

Steven Gerrard has warned Alfredo Morelos his goalscoring reputation counts for nothing now that he does not have to rely solely on the Colombian to lead Rangers’ attack.

The Lille target was left out of Gerrard’s squad entirely last week as new signings Kemar Roofe and Cedric Itten got the nod to start against Kilmarnock.

The decision to drop a man who has topped the Ibrox scoring charts in each of the last three seasons came in the wake of Gers’ decision to knock back a £16 million bid from the French club.

After the 2-0 win – which saw Roofe open his Ibrox account – Gerrard questioned the 24-yearold’s focus, claiming it was an easy call to leave him out as he had taken “his eye off the ball”.

But the while the Light Blues boss has welcomed an improvement in attitude this week from Morelos, he says it may not be enough to earn the striker a recall against Hamilton tomorrow after praising the impact of his new strike force.

“I’ll make a decision on whether Alfredo is involved tomorrow later today,” said Gerrard on the eve of his side’s trip to the Foys Stadium.

“What I will say is that we have definitely seen a difference in his application. He has refocused himself into training well and worked hard this week.

“But I will wait until the end of today before deciding on whether he is included or not.

“As a manager you analyse your players on a daily basis and pick the ones you think are going to get you the right result.

“You don’t pick on name or reputation. You pick the players who are training hard, who are focused and who are listening, taking messages on board and going to give you the best chance for your team to get the right result.

“Last week we made a decision for the benefit of the team and the squad.

“Cedric and Kemar came in and I thought their application was really good, I was really happy with their performance considering it was their first starts. There was real positive signs with Kemar getting off the mark and Cedric’s work rate.”

Joe Aribo’s return from an ankle knock has also been delayed until after next month’s opening round of Nations League fixtures.

But Gerrard insists he has no plans to force his international stars to turn down caps and stay in Scotland because of the coronavirus crisis.

Fifa has relaxed call-up rules in light of Covid-19, meaning clubs do not have to release players if they are travelling to virus hotspots.

Ryan Jack and Jon Mclaughlin are set to travel to the Czech Republic with Scotland even though it has now been taken off the UK’S travel exemption list, while Filip Helander, Glen Kamara, Jordan Jones, Steven Davis, Ianis Hagi and Borna Barisic are also due to jet across the Continent for duty with their respective nations.

Hamilton midfielder Will Collar is back training with the first team for the first time this season but will not be ready to play against Gers.

Club captain Brian Easton is still out following ankle surgery.

● Bottom side Livingston will field their new signing, former Celtic striker Anthony Stokes, in the home clash with Ross County.