Son Heung-min v Julian Alvarez: Who should Dream Team gaffers select as third striker?

DREAM TEAM managers have a lot on their plate right now.

One of the most common debates this week will concern the third striker spot.

With Erling Haaland (£8.3m) and Mohamed Salah (£6.7m) deservedly the two-most popular forwards in the game, many gaffers will have to think carefully about the final place in their front line.

Persuasive cases can be made for Darwin Nunez (£4.1m), Gabriel Jesus (£5.2m), Evan Ferguson (£3.4m) and Odsonne Edouard (£3m) but, right now, Son Heung-min (£4.7m) and Julian Alvarez (£4.4m) are seemingly the two best candidates.

Manchester City’s No19 remains the fourth-best performer overall in Dream Team this season despite taking Nottingham Forest for just three points on Saturday.

The World Cup winner has four goals and five assists to his name having thrived in the No10 role in Pep Guardiola’s system so far in 2023/24.

Haaland is the only player to have registered more shots on target than Alvarez and Jordan Ayew (£2.9m) is the only forward to have earned more bonus points.

The Argentina international’s ginormous return of 29 points in Gameweek 5 sent out a clear message that he is nobody’s understudy this season.

Haaland remains the treble-winner’s primary goal threat but Alvarez has carved out a role of his own in which he’s capable of dictating games, just as he did against Red Star Belgrade in the Champions League.

Prior to the weekend, the 23-year-old was comfortably the optimum choice to partner Haaland and Salah in Dream Team’s perfect front three.

However, Sunday’s events at the Emirates have prompted a re-evaluation.

Son became Tottenham’s derby day hero when he scored a brace on enemy soil to help his side come from behind twice and share the honours at full time.

Spurs’ captain bagged 15 points when all was said and done in North London to take his grand total to 50 for the season.

The South Korean superstar is yet to register an assist but he’s scored five goals – only Haaland has more at the time of writing.

Many fans suspected that Ange Postecoglou’s attack-focused tactics would restore Son to his formidable best after a subdued 2022/23 and the early signs suggest such thinking was sound.

He’s looked particularly threatening since his switch to centre-forward a couple of weeks back, benefiting from James Maddison’s (£4.4m) superb playmaking as the focal point of a dynamic attacking unit.

And that’s arguably an advantage Son has over Alvarez, who will not be his side’s most-advanced threat as long as Haaland is fit.

Both are fantastic options but the Man City man may edge it at this moment in time because of his European fixtures.

In fact, that’s the key difference between the two forwards so far.

Son has produced 49 points from his six league fixtures so far while Alvarez has earned 41 but the latter is 12 points ahead in the rankings overall because of his massive 21-point return in City’s first Champions League game of the campaign.

If Son can score twice against Arsenal than he’s got every chance of producing the goods again in Gameweek 7 against Liverpool but he’ll have to play out of skin to outscore Alvarez, who is likely to start against Wolves and RB Leipzig in the same time frame.

Son is technically the most in-form player in the game right now having averaged 12.7 points-per-game across his last three outings and he may well be the superior selection down the line but betting against Alvarez’s additional fixtures is asking for trouble at present.

Source: Soccer - thesun.co.uk