Arsenal vs Man City: What’s the ‘Community Shield curse’ and how bad is it?
Does the Community Shield really matter? Well, if the past few years are anything to go by, it might be better not to win it.
For many, it’s just a glorified friendly. But the managers involved will regularly insist not as they aim to head into the Premier League season with momentum.
And so, when Arsenal and Manchester City face off in this year’s Community Shield, they’ll be wanting to win.
Probably the two most likely contenders for the 2026-27 Premier League title, this will be their first chance to show what they’re all about this season.
However, recent history shows that doing well in the Community Shield doesn’t often lead to success in the Premier League. Rarely so, in fact.
The last time the team who won the Community Shield went on to win that season’s Premier League as well was in 2018, when Manchester City beat Chelsea before completing the clean sweep of domestic trophies for the 2018-19 season.
Since then, here’s what’s happened to the Community Shield winners.
2019: Manchester City beat Liverpool on penalties; finish second in the Premier League
2020: Arsenal beat Liverpool on penalties; finish eighth in the Premier League
2021: Leicester City beat Manchester City; finish eighth in the Premier League
2022: Liverpool beat Manchester City; finish fifth in the Premier League
2023: Arsenal beat Manchester City on penalties; finish second in the Premier League
2024: Manchester City beat Manchester United on penalties; finish third in the Premier League
2025: Crystal Palace beat Liverpool on penalties; finish 15th in the Premier League
As for the losers:
2019: Liverpool win the league
2020: Liverpool finish third
2021: Manchester City win the league
2022: Manchester City win the league
2023: Manchester City win the league
2024: Manchester United finish 15th
2025: Liverpool finish fifth
Thus, it’s a mixed bag, but there have been four cases of the Community Shield losers winning the following Premier League since the Community Shield winners last did.
In fact, since the start of the Premier League in 1992, only eight Community Shield winners have gone on to top the table by the end of the season.
It won’t help the narrative of it being a needless fixture, but maybe it’s best to avoid winning it after all.
