Pep Guardiola hailed the performance of Julian Alvarez on his debut, and made a comparison to former Blues attacker Gabriel Jesus.
Alvarez started as the central striker in a front three as two Kevin de Bruyne strikes saw City beat Club America 2-1 in Houston. The 22-year-old lasted 71 minutes as fellow new signing Erling Haaland was left on the bench as a precautionary measure.
The Argentine was lively throughout, pressing relentlessly through the middle and dragging defenders out of position with his blistering runs. The latter was clearly part of Guardiola's game plan, a strategy that allowed De Bruyne to find plenty of space at the edge of the box.
READ MORE: Grealish gives verdict on Haaland and Alvarez
He might not have scored the debut goal he would have dreamed of, but the attitude and work-rate of Alvarez was what really pleased Guardiola, and reminded him of a player City recently sold to Arsenal.
"Julian [Alvarez] was incredible, defensively he is quite similar like Gabriel [Jesus]," Guardiola said. "Gabriel is probably the best, but he [Alvarez] is close to him in aggression and how intuitive he is, he makes the runs and with the ball he’s absolutely brilliant. He can keep the ball and you can link with him without a problem.
"We have the feeling we signed a top-class young player for the next years to come, and we are delighted. The job that [manager] Marcelo Gallardo did at River Plate, we have the benefit, and hopefully he can grow up in an important league like Premier League."
Guardiola confirmed that Haaland will start City's next friendly against Bayern Munich in Green Bay on Saturday evening, after he was left out as a precautionary measure having suffered from 'niggles' in training.
That means Alvarez will likely start on the bench, but in Houston he did more than enough to show he will be a serious attacking option for City this season, rather than just back-up for Haaland.
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