A Champions League Supercomputer has backed Arsenal to land the trophy this season, in what would mark the first title in the club’s history.
Arsenal have never been crowned champions of Europe’s elite club competition before, with their best performance coming in 2005-06 when they finished as runners-up to Barcelona.
The fact that Arsenal have never won the Champions League, or it’s predecessor, the European Cup, is somewhat surprising giving they are one of the most successful domestic teams in England.
Arsenal are 13-time champions of England – behind only Manchester United and Liverpool – and have clinched a record 14 FA Cup trophies.
The Gunners reached the Champions League quarter-finals last season but lost to German side Bayern Munich over two legs.
The Champions League was revamped for the current 2024-25 campaign, with a new-look league phase replacing the traditional group stage.
Arsenal finished third in the league phase this term to book a spot in the Champions League last 16, where they have been drawn to face Dutch club PSV.
The draw for the Champions League last 16 took place on Friday with abettingexpert.com Supercomputer – known as BETSiE – now predicting that Arsenal will go all the way for the first time ever.
‘BETSiE ran its algorithm to predict who will win Champions League 2024-25 after the knockouts draw was concluded today,’ a bettingexpert.com spokesperson said. ‘The Supercomputer simulated the season 100,000 times.
‘The Supercomputer takes into account all match results from last season (across all competitions), pre-season results and the current season as it progresses, projecting the season based on both pre-season expectations and xG earned both for and against during the season.
‘It now also integrates team financial data and player values from Transfermarkt. This additional layer of data provides a more nuanced understanding of team capabilities and potential performance variations.
‘Based on the simulations as per the above mentioned factors, Arsenal are BETSiE’s favourites with a 22.4 percent win probability for the whole tournament.
‘FC Barcelona are second favourites with a 15.2 percent win probability for the whole tournament, followed by Real Madrid.’
Despite being tipped for Champions League glory, Arsenal manager Mikel Arteta is expecting a ‘very difficult’ test against PSV in the last 16.
‘Well we played against them [in the league phase] and they are a really good team, we know that,’ Arteta said.
‘We have experienced it and it will be very difficult, like any other Champions League result that we could have got or any team.
‘We know we we are facing when we are at this stage. Every team is really, really good and once the time comes we will be ready for it.’
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