Man City vs Arsenal: Peacock to stream biggest game of season
The long-awaited top-of-the-table clash between Manchester City and Arsenal is streaming exclusively on Peacock. Many Premier League fans see this fixture as the game of the season. The winner has an inside track to win the Premier League title. Meanwhile, the loser will need the other to drop points over the remaining five games.
This is not the first time NBC allotted a major clash to Peacock. Chelsea games against both Liverpool and Manchester City aired on Peacock earlier this year. Moreover, the previous game between the two, a 3-1 win for City at the Emirates, was available only on Peacock. More recently, Arsenal and Liverpool played out a thrilling 2-2 draw that only Peacock subscribers could watch in the United States. Therefore, it is nothing new to see a game of this caliber on the paid-streaming platform.
To be fair, though, a game of this magnitude is slightly surprising to see on Peacock. Other providers have done the same. For example, ESPN put El Clasico exclusively on ESPN+ on several occasions this season. Regardless of past tendencies, Premier League fans in the United States are upset that the game is behind an exclusive paywall.
The one silver lining is that the game is midweek. Therefore, the fact it is on streaming could make it easier for viewers in the United States. With a kickoff time set for 3 p.m. ET, many Americans are at work or school. Therefore, they can tune in to the Peacock app on their mobile device or computer to watch the game on the go.
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City and Arsenal on Peacock could still pull in large audiences
The argument for putting the game on either USA Network or NBC is that it will pull in a bigger audience. That is certainly true. Arsenal’s trip to Old Trafford to play Manchester United earlier in the campaign on NBC, Telemundo and even Peacock pulled in over 2.3 million viewers.
Peacock, which played a role in that number, has a impressive audience of its own. The aforementioned Liverpool-Arsenal game from April 2023 had an average minute audience of 872,000. This was the largest streaming audience for a Premier League game in US history.
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