Good afternoon and welcome to coverage of the Community Shield at Wembley between Liverpool and Crystal Palace.
As is customary, the match pits the Premier League champions against the FA Cup winners and the two team arrive in contrasting states.
Liverpool have sent a message to their rivals that they want to mount a serious defence of their title with the signings of Florian Wirtz, Hugo Ekitike, Jeremie Frimpong, Milos Kerkez.
“It’s nice if you can start the season by winning something. We have a chance at the beginning of the season. We face a difficult Crystal Palace side. They have shown how hard it is to win a one-off game with them,” manager Arne Slot said in his pre-match press conference.
“Counter-attacks, set-pieces, long-balls to (Palace striker Jean-Philippe) Mateta and individual quality of their forwards. (Athletic) Bilbao, AC Milan and Yokohama already gave us good competition (in pre-season).
