Arsenal vs. Manchester City pick: Premier League odds, predictions

It is quite simply the biggest soccer match of the year.

Every moment of this season has been building toward Wednesday’s match between first-place Arsenal and second-place Manchester City.

The Gunners currently lead the Cityzens by five points in the standings, but City has two games in hand on their title-chasing rivals and is in impeccable form.

It does feel like the winner (if there is one) of Wednesday’s match on the Blue Side of Manchester will be the team lifting the trophy at season’s end.

City is a -180 home favorite on Wednesday afternoon.

Arsenal vs. Manchester City pick

(3 p.m. ET)

You don’t really need to get too deep into the numbers before you realize that Manchester City is, once again, the best team in the world.

City leads the Premier League in goal difference, goals scored, expected goals created, big scoring chances generated and allowed and expected goal difference.

And in terms of form, the Cityzens have won six Premier League matches in a row, defeated Bayern Munich in the Champions League quarterfinals and advanced to the FA Cup Final.

There doesn’t seem to be any slowing this train down.

Arsenal, meanwhile, have picked a tough time to experience a dip in form.

Not only have the Gunners drawn their last three matches, but they blew two-goal leads in two of them and in the other they needed a multi-goal comeback against last-place Southampton.

And Arsenal’s current three-match winless streak only tells part of the story.

This has been coming.

From Matchweek 1 until the World Cup, Arsenal were the best defensive team in the competition.

Since then, they’ve looked like a mid-table defense that has a strong attack to bail it out.

Before the World Cup, Arsenal allowed 0.6 goals, 0.7 expected goals and 7.9 shots per game.

Since returning from Qatar, those numbers have jumped to 1.1, 9.5 and 1.1, respectively.

Those are not poor numbers, but they’re not what you’d expect from a team that is challenging for a title. 

Everything in the build-up for this match seems to be pointing to a Manchester City win, but in betting everything comes down to price and from a market perspective, there really is no value on betting City in this match.

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Sure, the Cityzens may win this match going away, but this the high-water mark for the two-time defending champions.

The lookahead lines for this match had City priced around -150/-155 not too long ago, so you’d be buying high if you got in now. 

As for Arsenal, this is about as low as the market has been on the Gunners since September.

You could absolutely make an argument that getting a team of Arsenal’s quality is worth a play at +475 no matter their form and I’d agree with that logic. 

The hype around City right now is warranted, but it’s also driving the market way too high.

There’s no choice but to take the value on the unfancied Gunners on Wednesday.

Arsenal vs. Manchester City prediction

Arsenal +475 (BetMGM)