It’s a question that many Gunners have been asking themselves throughout the year, and no team other than Liverpool over the last five years has been able to put an effective dent into Pep Guardiola’s footballing dynasty at the Etihad.

Mikel Arteta is a prodigy of the Pep school of football. We Arsenal fans are very grateful for how the Spaniard has turned our fortunes around. We’re playing much higher than we were throughout much of the 2010s and have experienced multiple domestic cup successes.

There are still a few Gooners who believe Mikel’s real test will be whether he can finally get Arsenal over the finish line in the Premier League. Could the 2024/25 season be the campaign where he finally does it?

To The Victor Goes The Spoils

The landscape of English football has changed remarkably since the 1980s. It’s gone from a game fused into the neighborhoods and communities of the English working class to an unrecognizable fantasy league of billionaire owners and players being paid obscene wages.

We’re not saying footballers shouldn’t get the wages they do; it’s driven by market demand. This same market demand makes winning the Premier League such a lucrative cash cow and money-spinner for clubs that can get themselves over the finish line over the exhaustive 38-game schedule.

Channeling The Enormous Success Of The EPL

An estimated global TV audience of 3 billion tunes into the Premier League, the biggest football betting market by quite some distance. This has resulted in the emergence of a range of different subsidiary markets that have found success, including highly successful podcasts, YouTube channels, and video gaming markets known as eSports, which have been able to generate colossal viewership over the last few years.

Such is the scale of the demand that eSports markets have also grown ancillary markets, where gaming fans can bet on the outcome of eSports tournaments and games. Although football games don’t have the same demand or viewing figures as some of the top eSports gambling markets like League Of Legends, many gamers believe that eSports, particularly football games, have plenty of room for growth. League of Legends is one game that has had tournaments with over a million concurrent viewers. It has a way to reach the Premier League standards, though, but similar markets have cropped up. We’ve seen the Premier League growing due to the gambling markets and the fact that sportsbooks offer markets on it. Like football, there’s a big market for Betting on League Of Legends matches at Thunderpick and the continued demand within eSports indicates that more popular games are set to follow. The gambling market can potentially help the sport itself grow in audience.

With football games set to continue riding this wave, it’ll be interesting to see how these eSports gambling markets shape up a few years from now, especially if the English domestic game continues dominating the airwaves and eSports continue to make headway.

If Arsenal can finally pip City and win their first league title in 20 years, not only will it be a historic moment in the club’s history and put the Gooners back where they belong at the top of English football, but it will lead to growth in global markets, ranging from new shirts, TV rights, video gaming rights and dozens of other deals that will bring money flooding into the club.

Chances Of 24/25 EPL Victory?

Teams that win the league or have historically broken another team’s monopoly in the English game have exclusively been able to tap into the value in the transfer market. Given how Arteta has changed our fortunes, there’s a higher caliber of players looking to establish themselves at The Emirates.

To look at the bookies odds, and they’re usually a solid indication of how it could shape up next year, there’s nothing really between Arsenal and City – with City around 13/10 and Arsenal at 2/1.

With growing rumors that Pep Guardiola will be leaving Man City at the end of next year and the elephant in the room of their 115 charges beginning to attract significant, negative media attention, many think this is the right time for City to lose their grip on their domestic dominance finally. There’s no other obvious candidate to take the reigns, except maybe Newcastle if they can steer clear of the injuries they suffered last season.

Liverpool are unlikely to join the trio of City and Arsenal as they transition following Jurgen Klopp’s shock resignation. Many of Liverpool’s top names are set to follow him out the door, and his replacement hasn’t attracted much optimism at Anfield, with many fans hoping they’d have brought in a bigger name.

Final Thoughts

It’s so challenging to predict the outcome of any season, but if the last few years are anything to go off, and if we measure up the disarray at Arsenal’s closest rivals, this is as good of a chance they’ve had for quite some time.

We might not have been asking this question if Son had managed to score for Spurs against City last year, but let’s not bring up that barrel of worms. If Arteta can keep the core of his team and make one or two notable additions, then City will have their work cut out for them again. While Pep will be keen to end his (reportedly) final year on a high, Arteta will have other plans to scupper the party. What a season it could turn out to be.

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