Community Shield - Arsenal v Manchester City Preview.

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OOJ - Manchester City celebrate David Silva's goal against Arsenal

The Community Shield is a strange occasion. Within the context of a season it’s essentially meaningless, but it annually benefits from being the first competitive game most fans have seen for a while – it’s a friendly, but it pretends not to be and we go along with that pretence for the sake of our own amusement.

Having finally treated their long-empty trophy cabinet to some FA Cup silverware last season, Arsenal have splashed the cash ahead of the new campaign to improve a squad that could now be capable of pushing for loftier titles.

Sunday’s opponents Manchester City have been surprisingly quiet in the transfer window, suggesting managerManuel Pellegrini is content with his squad ahead of their Premier League title defence.

TEAM NEWS

Arsenal boss Arsene Wenger must decide whether to unleash summer signings Alexis Sanchez, Calum Chambers and Mathieu Debuchy against Manchester City at Wembley.

Per Mertesacker, Mesut Ozil, and Lukas Podolski will all be absent owing to their extended post-World Cup break while Olivier Giroud is a doubt after struggling for fitness in the friendly defeat against Monaco.

Manchester City will be without eight players for Sunday's Community Shield clash with Arsenal at Wembley.

Frank Lampard is deemed not ready to feature yet following his arrival on loan, and the same applies to fellow new signing Bacary Sagna, along with Sergio Aguero, Pablo Zabaleta, Martin Demichelis, Fernandinho and skipper Vincent Kompany - six City players who were involved in the knockout stages of the World Cup.

Alvaro Negredo is the other man to miss out due to his foot injury, but there could be debuts for two new recruits in goalkeeper Willy Caballero and midfielder Fernando.

Arsene Wenger: "We are less vulnerable now, that is for sure. In the last two years we bought Ozil and Sanchez - five years ago we would have lost Ozil and Sanchez. We have more money available to buy today than we had five years ago. We can compete better. For years we have lost top players without the ability to replace them because of financial management. It is tiring to lose players - whether it be to Man City or somewhere else - it is the same. Southampton would say the same today. If you look at the team Southampton had last year and then add Oxlade-Chamberlain, Walcott and Gareth Bale you see the quality of the work they have done. They are in a similar position today to where we were before in relation to the other clubs who have superior financial power."

Manuel Pellegrini on the furore surrounding City's capture of Frank Lampard: "I think as managers we have enough problems with our own teams to be talking about other teams. The only thing I can say is that we have important restrictions about the amount of money we can spend, and Frank Lampard was a free player - we didn't spend any money in bringing him from New York City to Manchester City. I don't understand the reaction of Chelsea fans who say he is a traitor. The problem was not that Frank Lampard did not want to sign another contract with Chelsea - Chelsea didn't want him any more. He is a competitive player, he will be important for our team and we didn't spend any money on him, so the rules of financial fair play don't have any relation with Lampard."

Match Fixing, Nigeria league Board could be hitting hard on Pillars

The document was published by Today online news portal, and contains the minutes of an alleged meeting of one of the club's committees. The document, dated 4 May, has a heading that reads: "Match Officials Reception Committee of Kano Pillars Football Club."

According to the document, the main agenda of the meeting was to address the poor placement of the club on the league table as they were 14th in the standings with 13 points from 10 rounds of matches.

According to the document, the resolution passed at the meeting was to issue increased 'PR' to match officials for guaranteed away wins and away draws.

PR is a popular term for bribery in Nigerian business circles.

N820,000 was allegedly budgeted for the guaranteed away wins, out of which it was agreed that the Center Referee would get N500,000, while the two Assistant Referees would get N150,000 each, with N20,000 budgeted for Miscellaneous expenses.

Then for guaranteed away draws, a total of N620,000 was allegedly budgeted, out of which the Center Referee would receive N300,000, while the two Assistant Referees would receive N150,000 each, with N20,000 going for Miscellaneous expenses.

The meeting was allegedy held three days after the Sai Mesu Gida narrowly escaped a home defeat in a Week 10 fixture, after they came from behind to draw 1-1 with Heartland FC in Kano.

Subsequent to the alleged meeting, Kano Pillars won seven, drew three and lost once to collect 24 points from a possible 33 in that period.

Titles that have been won by Kano Pillars in recent times have been shrouded by suspicion from many observers.

Kano Pillars won the league last season after emerging victorious in a replayed fixture against Enyimba in Lokoja. The game had been awarded to Enyimba by the League Management Company (LMC) as a result of the violent conduct and pitch encroachment by the Pillars fans.

The decision was also affirmed by the Organization and Disciplinary Committee of the NFF, but was surprisingly overturned by the NFF's Appeals Committee which then ordered a replay of the game at a neutral ground.

The circumstances of their triumph in the previous season was also controversial. Enugu Rangers appeared poised to end their three decade-long trophy drought as they had a fair grip on the league title with only a few games left.

However, already relegated Ocean Boys refused to honour their remaining games, forcing the league's organisers to enforce the rules by expelling the now defunct club, and deducting all points gathered against them. Rangers who did the double over the Bayelsa State club lost six points, allowing Pillars who had not won against Ocean Boys to sail to the title on a superior goal difference.

Suspicions were further aroused when Rangers were not pronounced as champions when the then-NPL Congress under Victor Baribote was directed by the NFF to overturn the decision to expel Ocean Boys from the league, and instead record the club's boycotted matches as walkovers.