South London club Crystal Palace etched their name in history books as the 26th English club to emerge as community shield winners following a keenly contested encounter against premiership title holders Liverpool.

A highly anticipated match at Wembley stadium ended in stalemates with penalty shoots out as the decider. The eagles won 3-2 in the nerve racking kicks.

Palace clinched their first-ever major trophy with FA Cup glory here in May against Man City and twice came from behind to eventually defeat Liverpool, with sub Justin Devenny striking the winning spot-kick after his goalkeeper Dean Henderson had saved two and Mohamed Salah had skied another.

Liverpool has won the community shield for 16 times with Manchester united with the most 21, followed by Arsenal and Everton.It was a night of joy for Palace supporters a much needed distraction from their looming appeal hearing at CAS, which will determine on Monday whether they’ll compete in the Europa League or the Conference League this season. The fans didn’t hold back in expressing their frustration with UEFA, displaying banners in protest of the governing body’s decision to demote the club due to multi club ownership concerns.

For much of the match, Liverpool’s £265 million summer reinforcements looked set to steal the spotlight, with Hugo Ekitike and Jeremie Frimpong finding the net, and Milos Kerkez linking up well with Florian Wirtz during some fluid attacking sequences. Ekitike and Wirtz both had further chances after the break to seal the game for Liverpool.

However, Arne Slot’s side remained shakey defensively,reckless challenge from Virgil van Dijk on Ismaila Sarr gifted Jean-Philippe Mateta a penalty, which he converted. Van Dijk was also caught out of position later, allowing Adam Wharton to set up Sarr for a second equaliser that clipped in off the post.

Palace had earlier forced a fine save from Alisson following a strike from Eberechi Eze, and were controversially denied a penalty after the ball appeared to hit Alexis Mac Allister’s raised arm. A last gasp effort from Devenny narrowly missed, but he and Palace got their moment in a dramatic penalty shootout victory.

Published by Samuel Ofori-Ampaw.