Pep Guardiola is on the verge of signing the South American Footballer of the Year for an initial £17.9million.
River Plate star Julian Alvarez is expected to sign a five-year deal with Manchester City in the coming days, although he is likely to remain with his boyhood club on loan until at least this summer.
City, despite being incredible yet again this year, are certainly overdue some reinforcements in the forward line.
Alvarez looks a brilliant signing and is certainly one for the future, but the Blues may need a more established centre-forward to bolster Guardiola's options and pass on a few lessons to the man ambitiously dubbed "the new Sergio Aguero" by some of the more excitable observers.
As per Fabrizio Romano, the Alvarez deal won’t affect City’s plan to sign a top striker in the summer, which is great news for everyone involved (besides our Premier League rivals!). One man who has been heavily linked with a move to Manchester is Erling Haaland. A potential strike partnership of Haaland and Alvarez? Frighting.
In their latest Facebook Live the regular City is Ours duo of Dom Farrell and Alex Brotherton discussed City’s latest signing and future transfer priorities, while casting an eye back to Saturday's entertaining but frustrating 1-1 draw at Southampton.
AB: “One thing [that signing another striker in the summer] would bring is would just give them more options. Obviously it doesn't happen that often, but sometimes you do get those games like Crystal Palace at home or Southampton home this season where both teams set up very well to block the passing lanes that City like to use, to kind of disrupt the progression from the defence to the central holding midfielder to the forwards.
“Whereas if you had someone like a Haaland or an Alvarez that probably does give you the extra option of getting balls in the box as a different approach. When you play with a false nine, it's not much good just slinging balls in if you can't find a way through your normal methods, because there isn't actually anyone there to really get on the end of it.
“So it's probably just that Guardiola is not so proud of his new methods that he’s going to say 'no' to having extra options at the end of the day, so there'll be another option, I guess.”
DF: “ What gets thrown at Guardiola is he doesn't have a plan B, which is of course nonsense. There's so many different plans within the team.
"People talk about how he doesn't make substitutions a lot but there's so much he can change in-game with players that can play in various positions.
“Alvarez is another one of those [who can play in various positions] but I think Southampton this weekend was another good example of not being able to change it from the bench the way Pep would’ve liked.
"Raheem Sterling didn't have his best game, so Gabriel Jesus comes on on the right-wing. Once he's made that substitution then there's not really a great deal he can change other than do what we're doing a little bit better.
"Certainly more variety in forward options is something he wants in the squad and that's something that Julian Alvarez will bring in."
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