CHIC Charnley believes Rangers striker Alfredo Morelos is now being punished by referees because of his reputation – not necessarily the offences he commits on the park.

Partick Thistle great Charnley was a well-known hot head during his playing days and was red carded no fewer than 17 times in his 20 year career.

The former midfielder accepts that he deserved to receive his marching orders on the vast majority of those occasions – but is adamant that sometimes it was his notoriety which landed him in hot water.

Morelos - who picked up five red cards, one of which was rescinded, last season - was ordered off for the second time in three games in the 2-1 win over Celtic at Parkhead at the end of last month.

The striker, who has netted 28 goals in all competitions in the 2019/20 campaign, will miss the Ibrox club’s next three domestic fixtures as a result.

Passionate Celtic fan Charnley is an admirer of the South American as a footballer and feels that he could be getting into trouble with match officials because of his long list of previous offences.

“Morelos is a good player,” he said. “He brings a lot of it on himself and I know because there was nobody worse for that than me. Then the referees are right on him.

“I don’t know what he was thinking there (when he was sent off for diving at Celtic Park). He has definitely got something, but there is something not right as well – says me!

“But some of the things he shouldn’t be getting done for he is getting done for. It happened to me as well. It happened to me right throughout my career. It was all my own doing most of the time, but other times it wasn’t.

“I can remember playing a game at Tannadice one day. Somebody went through somebody. Dave Bowman and I were standing there at the halfway line and he said to me ‘if that was me or you we’d be getting done’.

“Your reputation definitely precedes you. There were maybe four or five times when I shouldn’t have got done and I got done. It is a tag you get."