Arsenal announced their Premier League title defence in emphatic fashion, thrashing Manchester City 3-0 to win the Community Shield at the Principality Stadium in Cardiff, the fixture's first visit to the Welsh capital since 2006. The comprehensive victory handed Mikel Arteta's side their third Community Shield in charge and their 18th overall, while offering a grim opening test for new City boss Enzo Maresca in his first competitive fixture at the helm.
The afternoon began disastrously for City. Just 24 seconds had elapsed when Myles Lewis-Skelly split City's defence with a defence-splitting pass, allowing Riccardo Calafiori to advance from full-back and finish coolly past goalkeeper Gianluigi Donnarumma. City, still searching for their shape under Maresca and missing Rodri amid speculation over a potential move to Barcelona, never recovered their footing.
Arsenal doubled their advantage in the 28th minute. Martin Odegaard floated a cross to the back post, where summer signing Christos Tzolis opted to head the ball across goal rather than shoot himself, teeing up Kai Havertz to nod home from close range as Donnarumma failed to keep it out. City had flickers of promise before the break — Phil Foden forced a save from David Raya that Ben White cleared, and Josko Gvardiol was required to make a goal-line clearance to deny Odegaard — but those moments proved mere punctuation in an otherwise one-sided contest.
The match was effectively settled three minutes into the second half when Odegaard struck again. Picking up Tzolis's pass, the Arsenal captain danced past Gvardiol before sending Donnarumma the wrong way with a dummy and rolling the ball into the empty net. It was Odegaard's first goal since December and prompted Arsenal supporters to serenade the shot-shy Italian goalkeeper with chants of