He reminds me of Tevez. Great signing for City unfortunately. How does City getting all these bargain signings for their first team.
Julian Alvarez | 75m + 20m add-ons (Euros) fee agreed with Atletico
- Thread starter SAFMUTD
- Start date
Good scouting team and faith in them when making purchases based on recommendations?
Think faith part is an issue with us. We sign all these young players like Amad but for some reasons they are not first team ready and we have to loan them out for couple seasons. We are targeting the wrong players or we have no faith in the players we sign.
it also helps having De Bruyne, Silva, Foden, Cancelo, etc and a working system to go along with. Much like how many youth players came through under Fergie and class players like Giggs, Scholes, Rooney, etc
But yeah Alvarez probably was more developed/ready than Amad.
I was already depressed about them having Alvarez and Haaland, you have to go on and remind me of the others.
Hopefully with Bruno, Case, Christian now, we can take a bit more risk in blooding youngster.
It seems to be a great signing, but it was not like he was a sure thing. They got him off the back of a single good season in Argentina and had done nothing for Argentina at the time. I though he was too lightweigth and would need more time myself. I've been really impressed by him this season. Unfortunately Alvarez can play out wide as too, so we'll see a lot of him for City despite never being the first choice up top for them.
Last edited:
Think a lot of clubs were in for Alvarez but in short, having Pep as manager and having a reputation for winning/competing for prizes gives you an edge - which is why I’m hoping ten Hag is super successful with us. Players would start wanting to play for us as well, as opposed to attracting players with inflated contracts only!
This cat has the dawg in him
Lets be honest here at City we take a chance on a player not working out especially one for £14m or £15m. I mean when you can take a £100m chance on Grealish £14m on Alvarez is pennies.
Also helps of course if he didn't work out we could probably sell him tomorrow for 4 times what we payed. Hell even Liam Delap would sell for double what we paid for Alvarez.
That release clause was stuipdly cheap all things considered. River Plate must be kicking themselves in hindsight.
Also helps of course if he didn't work out we could probably sell him tomorrow for 4 times what we payed. Hell even Liam Delap would sell for double what we paid for Alvarez.
That release clause was stuipdly cheap all things considered. River Plate must be kicking themselves in hindsight.
we still have 25% of Enzo Fernandez. It seems our front office learnt the lesson.
Didn't need any real good scouting for this one. His potential was well known for quite a few years, he could have done a Messi and been gone to Real when he was much younger if the international rules allowed it. I read he was also in Russia in 2018 training with the national team at the WC.
There were several big European clubs linked including Utd before he did move. City just went in a got him before anyone else took the chance.
Massive OTT reaction here as expected.
He has a decent enough tournament though.
He has a decent enough tournament though.
Rangnick suggested buying him last Jan.
Great for Cityof course... But was it good for him, he has the qualities to be a starter for a big club. And City is basically the only club in the world where the number 9 position is out of reach for the foreseeable future. (Haaland being only 22).
Decent enough player, but nothing special.
Yeah exactly. They aren't driven by number of engagements and mentions on social media while making purchase decisions. They just don't care.
He can give you Tevez’s output without his cuntnessing, is that even Word? But if you like what Tevez was you got to like Julian
I think that Tevez was a much better player.
Julian is only 22 and In Europe for only a couple of months. We’ll see where his career goes.
1) You're juding entire careers vs a 22 year old half way through his first season in european football
2) Those kinds of tournaments, just like others such as the champions league, show who are the players to step up and take responsibility on the big stage and who are the players who get a bit of stage fright and let the occasion be bigger than their character. This is why Argentina did well this time and some quality players in the past 10 years didnt manage to.
In club football of course 22 year old Alvarez has a long way to go to be as good as Tevez or Aguero. But starting the world cup final for the winning team, scoring 4 goals at the world cup and having 4 goals and 2 assists in his last 3 games (played 4 mins after that) for City is an outstanding start. If he can continue current form, get plenty of involvement at City for the rest of the season and get lets say 10 league goals then he would be well on his way to being like those players at club level too.
As for City taking chances that we dont? Well we do. Sometimes. Not as often. But for example Diallo and Pellistri were huge chances taken after we couldnt get Sancho and were going to wait for him. That was plenty of money we could have spent on an instant impact signing. Those were bigger chances than Alvarez, the top scorer and best player in Argentina who had proven more albeit older.
Diallo is starting to prove himself in the championship. I'd say the championship is a similar quality to Argentina so he's on his way to being as proven as Alvarez was at 21 when City signed him. But he's still got some way to go before he's the best player in the championship despite his recent run of games being so good. If he can do that perhaps he can show that he has some of the same character that Alvarez has shown in abundance to quickly take to playing at City and world cup level. We'll have to see
Pellistri on the other hand still has to show the signs of cutting edge in attack, goals and chances created as well as the character to take responsibility.
Diallo is starting to prove himself in the championship. I'd say the championship is a similar quality to Argentina so he's on his way to being as proven as Alvarez was at 21 when City signed him. But he's still got some way to go before he's the best player in the championship despite his recent run of games being so good. If he can do that perhaps he can show that he has some of the same character that Alvarez has shown in abundance to quickly take to playing at City and world cup level. We'll have to see
Pellistri on the other hand still has to show the signs of cutting edge in attack, goals and chances created as well as the character to take responsibility.
Sorry but can’t help here, never watched any championship game, can say, though, that Argentine league and Copa Libertadores are both very insanely intense.
Ok, but I think I can reasonably say that I know one thing or two about South American Football because there's a couple of portuguese coaches in Brazil, and I had the chance to watch closely Gallardo River or even Defensa Y Justicia under Beccacece against Brazilian clubs, particularly Palmeiras under Abel or Flamengo under Jorge Jesus, and by any means this players or clubs play worse football than Championship clubs.
It's the same thing as they try to sell us that Enzo Fernandez learned to play football in 4 months at Benfica, Alvarez learned to play under Guardiola or that Bruno Fernandes started to score goals under Solskjaer.
Sorry, nope, just because a certain League has more money it doesn't automatically makes them better at playing football. No way. When I mean intensity it's also related with climate issues, particularly in Brazil.
Last edited:
I agree, only going by what i saw at the world cup. But then again i saw a certain Luiz Suaurez (pre-liverpool) at South African World Cup (i think). He looked technically good but nothing suggested he'd become the player he did for liverpool. I suppose thats why scouting is such a roulette table.
The quality of of Copa Libertadores has been shit for at least 1 decade, it doesn't help that the best brazilian and argentinian players are in Europe.
Not sure about Championship level, but if Sevilla or Frankfurt played Copa Libertadores they would be favorites to win the whole thing definitely.
?
I've watched lots of River Plate over the past couple of years and I'm constantly looking at the stats in Argentina, then watching matches to identify the next Argentine stars. Thats how I identified Lisandro Martinez, Enzo Fernandes and Julian Alvarez before any EU media hype.
Your post is weird.
It has, not only because top South American players leave the Continent but because there's a growing financial gap between what top Brazilian clubs pay compared to Argentina and let's not even mention the rest.
If you saw the last 2 Club World Cup Finals played by Flamengo in 2019 vs Liverpool or Palmeiras vs Chelsea you can easily see this clubs are miles better than anything the Championship has.
But I agree with your first sentence regarding the loss of quality by Copa Libertadores.
1 team dont make an entire division. The mid table teams in the championship are better than those in the mid table of Argentina.
It's not weird because I wasn't directly saying those statements were made by you, but even some guys I know from Portugal have the audacity to think the football played by Enzo Fernandez at Benfica is much different than what he played at River, the guy has only been there for 4 months.
Sorry if I didn't explained well my point, I wanted to make a critic about general assumptions made about players who come from South America, not saying you were dismissing them.
Last edited:
I am not going to talk about mid table clubs in Argentina, but I can say with some knowledge no way mid table Championhip teams are better than mid table clubs in Brazil. No way my friend. Different football I agree, but not better.
knock out games are good. River played against Betis a month ago and won like 5~0 not sure about what you said.
Okay. Yeah thats what I assumed
Just keep in mind that while I myself made a post here about value in the argentine league and was able to identify some players who have then gone on to show quality at high levels... Major League Soccer are the ones who are mainly signing the players doing well in the Argentine league each season. And if you look in the MLS thers a whole bunch of Argentine players that are among their best players. So I'm sure that the MLS is stronger because of this but... Look I rate the championship highly. I'd back a lot of championship teams over MLS teams.
You have players like Maddison and Buendia who developed coming through there and the top teams in the championship can sometimes do well straight away in the premier league the next season.
Still Betis had some players on the WC no? Wasn't Pellegrini once a coach at River? Or was it San Lorenzo? By the way, who replaced Gallardo?
Demichelis. (I have just realized that it is an anagram for Demiliches)
I’d be shocked if he was close to as good as Tevez from what we’ve seen
Doesn’t mean he isn’t or can’t be a good complement piece
Yup, I can see you aren't one of those who is talking nonsense and you know your thing regarding South America. Probably you already knew about Lisandro Martinez at Defensa Y Justicia... before he went to Ajax I was sure he would make it even being a shorty type of defender, knew about him by some Brazilians related to scouting.
MLS is doing a great job recruiting top talent from South America, even some interesting guys from Brazil. Think Newcastle bought Almiron at Atlanta United?
You are right regarding the Championship, I am surprised some Premier League clubs don't take more risks there to sign new players, particularly those with less financial means.
Just to add, regarding good players from Equador check everything related with Independiente del Valle, they do a top job there developing talent. Sorry if I wasn't clear about my point. I can see more and more players coming directly from South America to the Premier League, certainly the guys at River if they see Benfica selling Enzo by a huge sum, they will ask more for their top players in the future.
How does a guy this young and this good want to spend his time playing second fiddle to the Nordic Yeti?
Well, argentinian economy being shit since the early 2000s doesn't help either.
Brazil will basically make the Copa Libertadores its backyard trophy, Argentina can't compete with Brazil at financial level.
If argentinian clubs could compete with Brazil 20 years ago it was basically because of talent... talent that they are losing progressively, and one of the reason, not the only, it's because gaming has gone mainstream, kids are more exposed to videogames since early age, and that is hampering the talent pool overall.
The same happens in Brazil, but they can get away with it because of massive population and shit on money invested in football academies.
City are the team to be at right now in England unfortunately. Great manager, solid system you can come into and learn, pays well. Why wouldn’t he go there
Because he should be playing every single game at this age.