Man City striker Julian Alvarez would take Mikel Arteta’s Arsenal side “to the next level” this season, according to former Gunners defender William Gallas.
The Citizens pipped the Gunners to the Premier League title on the final day of last season with Pep Guardiola’s men beating Arsenal to first place by two points.
Arsenal also ran Man City fairly close the previous campaign and they will be looking to go one better in the 2024/25 season as they look to finally end their long wait for a Premier League title.
The Gunners are getting better every season under Arteta and Arsenal have already brought in Gabriel Jesus and Oleksandr Zinchenko from title rivals Man City in the past.
And now former Arsenal defender Gallas thinks the Gunners should pursue Man City striker Alvarez if they get the chance this summer with reports linking the north London side with the Argentina international.
“Julian Alvarez would be a great signing for Arsenal,” Gallas told Genting Casino.
“He is a world champion, Copa America winner, won the Premier League twice in a row and won the Champions League.
“He has played most of City’s important games and is a starter for Argentina, he would bring so much winning experience to Arsenal and he looks like a player that wants to reach his very highest level by playing as many minutes as possible.
“Alvarez would take Arsenal to the next level, I don’t know if he could score 20 goals but he can play on the flank or behind the striker and be very influential.”
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Arsenal lost 2-1 to Liverpool in a pre-season friendly in the early hours of Thursday at Lincoln Financial Field and Arteta thinks his side are currently in “good condition” ahead of the new campaign.
Arteta said: “I think we are in good condition. I think we played some really competitive matches. Today was a really strong test. I think we started the game fantastically well. I think after six or seven minutes we should be 2-0 up.
“Then we lost control, especially with two things that we didn’t do well enough and we allowed them to run in transition, which is a really dangerous thing to do against them. And in the second half we improved a lot and we deserved more. But it was great, really difficult conditions to play. Great crowd and we’ve got a lot out of it so I’m really pleased.”
When asked about thoughts on the younger players in his squad, Arteta added: “I’m really pleased with all of them. Unfortunately, I wanted to give opportunities to all of them, but we didn’t have enough time to do so.
“But especially the ones that played, I think they performed and responded incredibly well. So that’s something that we take from the tour as well, that we have a lot of talent there that we want to use and they show that they are very much pushing to earn the right to play with us.”