Julian Alvarez is Man City's most prolific player after Erling Haaland - Pep Guardiola must find a way to fit him in

With the obvious exception of Erling Haaland, no one has a better goals-per-minute ratio in the Manchester City squad than Julian Alvarez. In fact, Haaland is the only player to have made more than 10 starts in the league who has scored in a higher percentage of starts in all competitions than Alvarez.

But City’s second-most efficient goalscorer ranks 16th in terms of minutes played in the Premier League among City's squad, and has started just eight out of 32 top-flight matches. He has played fewer minutes in the league than Joao Cancelo, who has not played for City since mid-January after going out on loan to Bayern Munich.

In his first season in Europe, the Argentina striker has proved to be both a highly productive player and an ideal fit in Pep Guardiola’s system. Yet despite his impressive output and his remarkable work-rate, he keeps finding himself on the bench.

For a player of his quality who is in the prime of his career aged 23 - not to mention the fact he is a recent World Cup winner - he needs to play far more than he has this season.

And after his match-winning display against Fulham, the least he deserves is to start against West Ham on Wednesday.