The Community Shield is up for grabs on Sunday afternoon, but Wembley won't be the host due to a bizarre scheduling clash with The Weeknd. Arsenal and Manchester City will contest the Community Shield somewhere unfamiliar on Sunday, with English football's traditional curtain-raiser taking place at Cardiff's Principality Stadium rather than Wembley. The reason? While Mikel Arteta and Enzo Maresca's teams are facing each other around 150 miles away, The Weeknd will be performing at Wembley on exactly the same day. And a closer look at the numbers surrounding the singer's enormous run of Wembley concerts shows just how much money is potentially being generated by the events occupying England's national stadium. Each year, the Premier League champions and FA Cup winners face off in a special match to raise money for grassroots initiatives, national charity partners like the Alzheimer's Society, and local causes nominated by the 124 clubs participating from the first round proper of the preceding FA Cup. Named the Community Shield, the match is viewed by many as the unofficial start to the football season, with the Premier League kicking the following weekend, August 22. This year it is Arsenal and Manchester City who will face off at 3pm on Sunday, but instead of taking place at Wembley the match will be played at the Principality Stadium in Cardiff. Back in May, the FA announced that Wembley would be unavailable on August 15 and 16 because of “pre-planned concerts,” meaning that the Community Shield landed, scheduled for the same weekend due to the altered 2026/27 football calendar, had to be moved. The concerts in question are part of The Weeknd's After Hours Til Dawn tour, with the pop star playing at Wembley five times in six days on August 14-16 and August 18-19. This year's community shield marks the third time that it has been hosted away from London for the third time since Wembley reopened in 2007, with Principality Stadium selected as the host for the first time since 2006, having served as the venue for the Community Shield, FA Cup final and EFL Cup final between 2001-2007.

How much money could The Weeknd's Wembley concerts generate? Although the decision is no doubt frustrating for fans hoping to visit the most iconic football ground in the country, the figures involved in staging The Weeknd's concert show just how lucrative the event could be. Tickets for The Weeknd at Wembley start from £60.25 for restricted-view seats, while standard seats rise to as much as £336.45 each. For fans looking to stand, general admission tickets cost £145, while Gold Circle tickets closer to the stage are priced at £177.75. Although the exact attendance is not yet known, the concerts are expected to have a capacity of around 87,000 to 90,000 people. The midpoint between the cheapest £60.25 ticket and the most expensive £336.45 standard ticket is £198.35. While that does not represent the actual average ticket price, it can be used to illustrate the enormous sums potentially involved. At £198.35 per ticket, a sellout crowd of 87,000 would generate around £17.26 million in gross ticket sales, rising to approximately £17.85 million with 90,000 people inside Wembley. And that's before considering the premium hospitality packages available. Wembley Stadium Gold and Diamond packages are priced at £599 and £799 per person respectively, while private-box experiences are available for a reported £10,000 to £20,000 per person.

What comes next? The Community Shield will take place at the Principality Stadium in Cardiff, with Arsenal and Manchester City facing off at 3pm on Sunday. The match will be a special occasion for the Welsh stadium, which has hosted several high-profile football matches in the past.

Why it matters for Arsenal The Community Shield is an important match for Arsenal, as it marks the start of the new football season. The match will be a chance for the team to showcase their skills and prepare for the upcoming Premier League season.

What happened? The Community Shield will be played at the Principality Stadium in Cardiff, rather than Wembley, due to The Weeknd's concerts. The concerts are part of The Weeknd's After Hours Til Dawn tour, with the pop star playing at Wembley five times in six days on August 14-16 and August 18-19.