Arteta praises Arsenal’s hunger after 3-0 Community Shield win over Manchester City in Cardiff
Mikel Arteta said his Arsenal players demonstrated their hunger to defend the Premier League title after they beat Manchester City 3-0 in the Community Shield at the Principality Stadium in Cardiff on August 16, 2026. The victory took place in Enzo Maresca’s first significant match in charge of City.
Arsenal ended a 22-year wait for the league title last season and are attempting to win back-to-back top-flight championships for the first time since 1934-35. The Community Shield provided an early competitive test between the reigning champions and City under their new manager. Arteta framed the result as evidence of the attitude he wants from his squad at the start of the campaign.
Riccardo Calafiori opened the scoring after 24 seconds, the fastest goal in the competition since Bobby Owen’s strike for City in 1968, Kai Havertz then doubled Arsenal’s lead, and captain Martin Ødegaard completed the scoring on 48 minutes. Christos Tzolis was involved in all three goals and drew specific praise from Arteta for his composure and final actions in the attacking third.
“I am obviously extremely happy with the performance, the result and winning the first trophy,” Arteta said. “We talked about the desire we have to start the season and to show ourselves how much we want it and I saw a lot of positive things against a top opponent. I’m very impressed in the manner that we played, in the manner that we competed. That’s the standard for us. If we drive the standards at this level, I’m sure that we’re going to be really, really competitive.”
Asked about the desire displayed by his team, Arteta added: “Because we want to go straight again. The desire comes [because] I want to live that moment again. I want to live other moments, even bigger than them … we know what it’s going to take. We know the difficulty of the task. We’ve never done it at this club, to win it again. We know that it’s going to demand something special and we are ready for it.”
Ødegaard said the performance showed Arsenal’s readiness to attempt consecutive titles. “We played some brilliant football,” he said. “[It was a] great performance and a great way to start the season. I always want to help the team as much as possible with goals and assists. I want to score more goals. We showed our level today. We’ve shown we’re ready. We’re serious and we want to do it again. We want to attack it. We want to do it again. When you get a taste of how nice it is you want to do it again. We want to win everything.”
Maresca acknowledged City were seeking reinforcements, saying: “Any new signing, the sooner they arrive the better because we are starting the Premier League in one week and if they start to work with us as soon as possible it’s better that they can also understand the way we want to play.” The club are closing on a deal to sign Lille’s Ayyoub Bouaddi as they prepare to sell Rodri to Barcelona; Rodri did not travel to Cardiff, Elliot Anderson started in midfield, and Jack Grealish came off the bench for his first City appearance since May 2025.
The 3-0 defeat represented the joint-heaviest loss for a City manager in their first game in charge, with Harry Newbould the most recent to suffer a three-goal opening defeat — 4-1, also to Arsenal, in 1906 — and it is Maresca’s joint-heaviest defeat as a manager in England.
Maresca said he was not alarmed by the manner of the defeat and outlined the immediate plan: “In general I’m always concerned, even when we win games so imagine how [concerned] that we didn’t win the game,” said the Italian. “It’s just the beginning, we have many things that we need to do better, I think the reaction was good after conceding the first goal and now try to reset and analyse the game and think from Tuesday about the next game.” City begin their Premier League campaign at home to Bournemouth on Sunday.