The 2026-27 English soccer season is ready to kick off on Sunday with this yr’s version of the Group Defend.
It is an annual match between the defending champions of the Premier League and the FA Cup, and it serves because the unofficial opening fixture of the English calendar.
This yr, the sport options two of England’s finest: Arsenal, who received their first Premier League trophy in 22 years final season, and Manchester City, who lifted the FA Cup regardless of falling to Arsenal within the league.
This is what to look at for as the 2 trophy winners meet for the primary time in 2026-27:
A altering of managerial roles
Arsenal’s Mikel Arteta is an achieved determine, however he is spent the vast majority of his profession firmly within the shadow of his mentor and former boss Pep Guardiola. Successful the Premier League over Guardiola’s Manchester Metropolis facet, subsequently, meant one thing particular to him.
“It’s clearly one of many largest challenges I’ve confronted in my profession, as a result of I do know the requirements,” Arteta said. “That they had the backroom, the soundness, the standard to go and do it once more.”
With Guardiola stepping away from Metropolis and Italian coach Enzo Maresca taking his place, Arteta is not the upstart challenger anymore: he is the longest-tenured coach within the Premier League and arguably probably the most well-known and revered one, too. This Group Defend match will probably be his first likelihood to step into that function in an actual method…and it will likely be Metropolis’s first match as a crew in transition since Guardiola joined the facet again in 2016.
Arsenal’s makeshift protection
Arsenal has one of many world’s finest center-back pairings in Brazil’s Gabriel Magalhaes and France’s William Saliba, however we cannot see it on this match: the pressure of the World Cup (and the 2025/26 season) sidelined Saliba with a critical again damage. He’ll be unavailable for Arsenal for a number of months, and which means Gabriel must construct a partnership with both Ecuador’s Piero Hincapié or Spain’s Cristhian Mosquera as a substitute. This match needs to be a superb touchpoint for simply how effectively these partnerships are coming alongside; early indicators from Arsenal’s preseason level to them needing some enchancment.
