By James Dailey
This is the second installment looking at the post-winter break period. In the prior piece, I reviewed how the common theory that The Rangers fell off a cliff performance-wise following the winter break was not well supported by overall performance statistics.
You can review the team-level stats here, but the basic summary was that Celtic ramped up the performance level while The Rangers stayed similar, despite a rash of injuries to first team players.
The Gruffalo
A significant contributor to the disparity in The Rangers results versus their underlying performance statistics was the collapse in Alfredo Morelos’ goal scoring.
The season really was a tale of two halves for the two strikers. Morelos’ xG declined from a high-level pre-break to one which was still rather good (and comparable to Edouard’s pre-break). Post-break his goal scoring rate collapsed to almost nothing, as Morelos scored a single goal in a 4-1 defeat of Hamilton in the Scottish Cup. In fact, he scored just once on 46 total shots in all games post-break, and 0 goals on 27 shots with an xG of 3.92 in league games!
Conversely, Edouard’s goal scoring exploded to almost 1 per game, while his xG increased to an elite level. In addition (not shown), he generated xA post-break which was that of an elite attacking midfielder. In some respects, the relative xG production of the two strikers flipped pre- and post-break, but Morelos’ actual scoring did not reflect the chances he created.
Is it plausible that widely reported off-field issues, including the health of a close family member, may have impacted his on-field performances? Regardless of the underlying reasons, Morelos’ performance level remained that of a good striker, but his finishing was unsustainably catastrophic.
Conclusion
It is certainly possible that both Rangers and Morelos would have continued to dramatically underperform their underlying stats for the remainder of the season, and Celtic would have run away with a 20-point margin.
However, it is also possible, and I would argue statistically more likely, that Morelos would have at least improved somewhat from 1 for 46 shooting.
The difference between a 10-point margin (assuming game in hand) and a 5-point margin may have been, at least partially, due to alleged infidelity, a private detective, and a parent in ill health.