When Arsenal last won the Premier League: No Instagram, Dhoni uncapped, Netflix was only mailing DVDs

Arsenal have finally won the Premier League after 22 years. The dramatic title race concluded on Tuesday when their closest rivals, Manchester City, failed to secure a win against Bournemouth. The result handed the title to the Gunners with one game to spare.

Wild celebrations erupted across London as Arsenal fans finally saw their team finish top of the Premier League table after three consecutive second-place finishes. This is Arsenal’s first Premier League title since Arsene Wenger’s “Invincibles” side triumphed in the 2003–04 season.

While Arsenal’s fortunes have improved dramatically this season, the world beyond football has transformed beyond recognition in their 22 years pf drought. Here’s how different the world, and India, looked when Arsenal last lifted the Premier League trophy.

When Arsenal last won Premier League...

Social media as we know it was in its infancy. Facebook had only just launched and was limited to Harvard University students. YouTube, Twitter, Instagram, and TikTok did not exist. Smartphones had not yet arrived and the first iPhone was still three years away. Netflix, today’s streaming giant, was a DVD-by-mail rental service.

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In English football, Manchester City were a mid-table side still recovering from relegation a couple of seasons earlier. Chelsea were an ambitious but mid-table club yet to become a major force. Manchester United were at the peak of their powers under Alex Ferguson.

Legendary manager Alex Ferguson was still leading Man United in 2004. (Reuters)

A 17-year-old Cristiano Ronaldo had only recently broken into Sporting CP’s first team, while Lionel Messi was still a promising youngster yet to make his senior professional debut.

Usain Bolt, the fastest man ever, was yet to win any of his 12 Olympic gold medals. In tennis, Roger Federer had two Grand Slam titles while Rafael Nadal was still a promising youngster and Novak Djokovic largely unknown.

In the United States, George W. Bush was president under whom the country had invaded Iraq a year ago, and Saddam Hussein had been captured just a few months earlier. Donald Trump, the current president, was at the peak of his reality TV fame, hosting the hugely popular show The Apprentice.

In India, a major political shift was underway. Manmohan Singh was sworn in as Prime Minister just days after Arsenal's win. The current incumbent Narendra Modi was the Chief Minister of Gujarat, serving in the early years of his long tenure in the state.

PM Narendra Modi in a file photo (ANI)

Cricket remained India’s undisputed favourite sport, but the national team was far less dominant than it is today. T20 cricket had just been invented, but only Test and ODI formats existed on international level. The Indian Premier League was still four years away, launched in 2008. MS Dhoni made his international debut later that year, while Virat Kohli and Rohit Sharma were still schoolboys, more than two years away from their senior debuts.

The Marvel Cinematic Universe had not even been conceived. The first MCU film, Iron Man, was still four years away. In Bollywood, no film had ever crossed Rs 100 crore at the Indian box office. In contrast, in the last six months alone, two major “Dhurandhar” films have each crossed Rs 1,000 crore in India.