Arsenal 3-0 Man City: 5 things we learned from the Community Shieldd

As Arsenal hammered Man City in the season's traditional curtain-raiser, we take a look at what we can conclude from our afternoon at Wembley

Arsenal won their first piece of silverware this season, beating Manchester City 3-0 to claim the Community Shield at Wembley.

Santi Cazorla netted the opener before Aaron Ramsey doubled their lead before half-time.

Substitute Olivier Giroud scored a stunner from distance to put the game beyond a weakened Manchester City side, who were missing the likes of Vincent Kompany, Bacary Sagna, Sergio Aguero and Pablo Zabaleta.

And here are five things we learned from the Community Shield. .

We can't take too much from this

The lost Boy: The likes of Boyata won't be featuring when it really matters  

Arsenal were by far the better side and deserved to win by a margin, but it would be foolish to read too much into a game where both sides were missing plenty of first-choice players.

Nobody expects Dedryck Boyata to start when Manchester City open their Premier League title defence next week, and similarly the likes of Bruno Zuculini are incredibly unlikely to feature.

But Manuel Pellegrini will still be bothered by his side's lack of cohesion and urgency.

The Chilean, usually quite reserved, was seen jabbing and prodding feverishly on the touchline during the first half as his side lacked urgency. It's not just the names that need to return to this City side, it's last season's fluency and desire.

Meanwhile for Arsenal, second string or not, it was a great way to finish pre-season with the three Germans yet to return and at least one new signing to come.

Four-four-f*****g-two

Formation men: Pellegrini got it wrong up against Wenger's side  

Manuel Pellegrini stuck with Mike Bassett's favourite formation for this game and it was a significant contributory factor in his side getting pummelled.

It is undoubtedly a useful shape, and one that will continue to see a revival this season with the parallel rise of the 3-5-2, but up against Arsenal's classic 4-2-3-1 there was simply too much for Fernando and Yaya Toure to deal with in that central area.

Wenger's men simply overran the game in midfield early on and the champions never got a foothold. Stevan Jovetic didn't particularly drop in and help out his floundering teammates while Edin Dzeko strolled around aimlessly in attack, and it was all too easy for the Gunners.