Manchester City 3-0 Arsenal: A disaster-class from David Luiz earns City victory on the return of the Premier League

Aside from crowd noise not matching the tone of the match for those of you who watched City's impressive 3-0 against Arsenal on Sky Sports Main Event, the return of the Premier League was a welcome sight after 3 months of no football in England.

Kevin De Bruyne, Raheem Sterling and Phil Foden were all on target in a dominant performance from Manchester City. However City owed much of their success thanks to the hapless David Luiz.

Story of the Match

In a year of instability, sadness and turmoil, City's victory on Wednesday night brought back a sense of normality, as Kevin De Bruyne produced a man-of-the-match performance against Arsenal at the Etihad on Wednesday evening.

Arsenal arrived into this match having been unbeaten domestically in 2020. Whilst their unbeaten run lasted longer than expected due to unforeseen circumstances that position would soon be under threat from City's attacking prowess.

Early on City forced a good save from Bernd Leno following a free-kick 20 yards out from Kevin De Bruyne, the German who has been a shining light in what has been a dim season for the gunners produced a fine save tipping the Belgian's effort over the bar.

Arsenal were bright for the first 30 minutes of the match relying on the counter attack from the pacy Aubameyang, Saka and Nketiah however, that was as bright as it got from the Gunners who rarely looked like troubling Ederson and his goal.

Eventually the pattern of the match took its place and it was just a matter of time before City would open the scoring. Sterling produced another save from Leno cutting inside on the left wing and forcing the keeper to dive low to his left.

Arsenal's keeper was called into action again moments later with an even more impressive save following Gabriel Jesus' reverse pass into David Silva inside the penalty area.

Just as Arsenal thought they had survived City's onslaught with the game approaching half time, David Luiz produced his first damming error of the match.

De Bruyne, usually involved in all the good play the Blues create was involved again, the midfielder 40 yards out on the byline played a forward pass to Sterling which should have been easily intercepted by the Brazilian centre-back, but he failed to control the pass and allowed the ball to go beyond him into Sterling.

The Englishman had missed a few chances prior to this one but he made no mistake this time and smashed the shot into the left of the goal giving Leno no chance.

As the second half resumed, any hope of a successful second half on Mikel Arteta's return to Manchester City was swiftly brought to an end following another slick attack from City.

Ederson who's passing was a joy to behold, produced a wonderful pass to the right wing to David Silva who headed the ball down to Riyad Mahrez who subsequently produced a superb first touch to take the ball round Luiz giving the defender no choice but to drag down the Algerian and award City a penalty.

Luiz who has been described as 'uncoachable' by Gary Neville in the past, further proved the Sky Sports pundit right and had his short cameo brought to an end by Anthony Taylor who had no choice but to send him off. De Bruyne stepped up and slotted the penalty into the bottom right-hand corner,sending Leno the wrong way.

City nearly had the perfect evening but the night had a moment of sadness as the young, Eric Garcia had to be stretchered off following a collision with his own teammate. Ederson.

As the game diminished City still had time to ensure they recorded yet another 3-0 win against Arsenal, a recurring scoreline between the two teams.

Kyle Walker received the ball on the right of midfield who laid his pass into substitute Sergio Aguero who played a one-two with Sterling. The winger played in the Argentine who had his shot saved onto the post by Arsenal's man-of-the-match Leno, however the rebound fell to Foden who smashed the shot into the roof of the net.

An exciting return to the Premier League as project restart well and truly got off to a flying start.

Takeaways from the match

An all round impressive performance to please Pep

Whilst many of us will not remember City's last performance and result, Pep Guardiola will certainly have not forgotten about it. A 2-0 loss against rivals, Manchester United would have deeply angered him but there would be no repeat in this match as City were clinical, stylish and all together excellent from the first minute to last

Plenty of work still to do for Mikel Arteta

It was a less than encouraging performance for Arteta, as Arsenal showed very little quality going forward and did not show anywhere near enough defensive nous to stop City.

The Spaniard will definitely be aware of the task he has in turning round Arsenal's horrific form away from home against the top 6, as they look to regain some form in the games to come to try and secure European football next season.