‘Several Championship clubs’ in the race to sign Santos flop Morelos

Several English Championship sides are eyeing a move for Alfredo Morelos according to TEAMtalk.

They seem to have overlooked the fact that the chunky Colombian was available to sign on a pre-contract deal from January 1 without a sniff of interest from anywhere.

Once he had picked up his final Ibrox payslip Morelos was linked with clubs in Russia, Saudi Arabia and Turkey with absolutely no substance to any of those claims.

Alongside Football Insider, TEAMtalk specialises in churning out the most far-fetched transfer tales, anything of a positive nature Ibrox wise can be guaranteed a mention on the BBC Scotland Gossip page.

It is around 20 months since Morelos showed even moderate form at Ibrox, a thigh injury in March 2022 brought the 21/22 season to an end, last season he made fleeting appearances under Giovanni van Bronckhorst and Micky Beale.

Now after three appearances for Santos totalling 76 minutes the 27-year-old is in high demand in the Championship where clubs play 46 matches a season with the prospect of more through the play-offs.

In typical fashion TEAMtalk reports:

Watford are among several Championship clubs eyeing a January move for former Rangers star Alfredo Morelos after his current club Santos were relegated, TEAMtalk can exclusively reveal.

Brazilian football was handed a huge shock on Wednesday when one of the nation’s biggest clubs suffered the unthinkable, as Santos were relegated to the second division. It caused outrage among the club’s fans, who took the streets to show their anger by starting fires and trashing the local area.

Relegation has left question marks over the future of a number of stars who have release clauses in their contracts that have now become active with the club dropping into the second tier.

One such player is striker Morelos, who only joined the club after his contract expired at Rangers over the summer. Santos have a clause in his deal to allow them to release him but that is unlikely at this point.

Sources have confirmed to TEAMtalk that a loan exit is the most likely outcome as clubs in the UK and around Europe would be keen to speak with Santos about a potential short-term deal. The best outcome for all parties seems to be a loan with an option to buy next summer.

This sort of ‘report’ is guaranteed to be picked up by Ibrox fans and the Scottish media, after enjoying a long winter break Morelos is expected to join a lower league club in Columbia accompanied by bursts of transfer speculation about the former Barcelona target.

During seven years at Ibrox Morelos won one medal and scored once against Celtic in front of fans, a consolation in the 2023 Viaplay Cup Final. Three minutes later he was substituted by the Brains Behind Gerrard.