Arsenal Win Community Shield as Maresca Gets Off to Losing Start

The Premier League season begins on Friday, the 21st of August, with the traditional curtain-raiser of the Community Shield having taken place this weekend. It was bad news for 46-year-old Enzo Maresca, the Italian who was handed the job of succeeding Pep Guardiola at Manchester City.

He took charge of his first competitive match on Sunday and lost it, 3-0 to Arsenal. Whether you think that that actually means anything or not will depend on your view of the game itself as a competitive fixture, with most viewing it as no more than a glorified friendly.

Arsenal Carrying On From Where They Left Off

What made the afternoon unusual wasn’t the scoreline, so much as just how quickly Arsenal managed to get out of the starting blocks. Riccardo Calafiori scored after 23 seconds for the defending Premier League champions, which is the quickest goal in the competition’s history and the first inside the opening minute since Manchester City’s own Bobby Owen managed it against West Bromwich Albion, back in 1968. Was that City’s whole season laid out in miniature, or one bad afternoon that the new manager can hope to learn from?

Annual reminder that the Community Shield used to be called the Charity Shield, but so little money actually went to charity that the government told them to either start making serious contributions or change the name.

So they changed the name.

— Grace Robertson 🏳️‍⚧️ (@graceonfootball.com) 16 August 2026 at 14:54

Calafiori’s goal came from a low ball by Myles Lewis-Skelly on the edge of the area, dispatched into the bottom corner before most of the crowd at the Principality Stadium in Wales had sat down. The Community Shield was played in Cardiff rather than at its usual home this year because Wembley had already been booked, for five nights running, by The Weeknd. The good news for the new boss is that City didn’t fold completely. Maresca said afterwards that his side created three or four chances to level the score before Kai Havertz headed in Arsenal’s second, in the 28th minute.

Havertz converted a knockdown from Christos Tzolis, the 24-year-old Greek winger signed from Club Brugge for £34 million this summer, after Martin Odegaard had crossed from the left. Odegaard was named Player of the Match, not least because he added a third in the 48th minute, dummying past goalkeeper Gianluigi Donnarumma after another pass from Tzolis. Maresca’s explanation afterwards looked at the goals conceded rather than the one scored. “For sure, the first two goals we concede I don’t like,” he said.

Guardiola left City after a decade and 20 major trophies to take up an ambassadorial role with City Football Group, the club’s ownership vehicle, rather than another managerial role. Arsenal, meanwhile, began the defence of a Premier League title they had waited 22 years for looking as assured as they did in May. Best guess is that Sunday said less about where Manchester City will finish next May than about how sharp Arsenal already are in the third week of August. The real evidence starts on Friday, but it’s a less than ideal start for the new Man City boss.