London (AFP)

Laborious and still running in, Liverpool lost on penalties (1-1, 5 tab to 4) during the Community Shield which opens the English football season, against an Arsenal in progress, Saturday at Wembley.

In a still surprising atmosphere, with total closed doors, Mikel Arteta and his players confirmed that the Londoners intend to do much better than their mediocre 8th place last year.

"I would be surprised if we played our best game of the season," warned Jürgen Klopp before the game, his team just coming out of a lot of land work and having, by his own admission, the legs a little heavy.

This was seen in the first period in particular, with a team game well in place and a ball often confiscated from the opponent, but a lack of rhythm in the last 30 meters preventing the Reds from getting into a good position.

Klopp had yet aligned a team quite close to his eleven major, except for the presence of Neco Williams in place of Trent Alexander-Arnold, insufficiently recovered at once, at the right-back position.

The second half, especially with the entry of the Japanese Takumi Minamino shortly before the hour mark, gave more dynamism to the red vanguard.

Arsenal, for their part, remained on the good momentum of the end of last season, showing a lot of consistency in their offensive approaches, spent ten laborious minutes at the very beginning.

On several occasions judiciously using the long game and the projections of the full-backs or midfielders to create gaps, the Gunners opened the scoring on a school goal, scored by the inevitable Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang, with a shot enveloped in 20 meters (1-0, 12th).

- Arsenal still do not know how to keep a result -

This goal, celebrated by the Gabonese by making the gesture of the character of Black Panther, the black superhero played by Chadwick Boseman, who died on Saturday of colon cancer, was his 5th at Wembley, after doubles in the semi-finals and FA Cup final, which makes him the most prolific Gunner in this legendary arena.

Arsenal will be able to bite their fingers for not having driven the point home when he had the ascendancy in speed, as on this shot from Eddy Nketiah at the entrance to the surface beautifully repelled by Alisson (18th).

But while Arsenal have learned to attack well since Arteta arrived last December, there is one thing they still can't do: keep a result.

Roberto Firmino had missed the frame very little on the return from the locker room (51st) and Emiliano Martinez, still preferred in the cages to Bernd Leno, had saved his people twice in front of Sadio Mané (56th, 80th).

But Minamino ended up offering a deserved equalizer to the Reds after a somewhat confused action in the box (1-1, 73 '). Then the result was decided by a penalty shootout, without going through the extra time box.

Young striker Rhian Brewster (20) unfortunately found the top of the crossbar on the Reds' third attempt and Aubameyang was in charge of transforming Arsenal's fifth try into a relaxed atmosphere to offer his team, after the FA Cup, a second trophy in just under a month.

In the women's version of this competition, as a curtain raiser, other Londoners, Chelsea players, won 2-0 against Manchester City.

© 2020 AFP