Community Shield to be played on August 29 with Wembley set to host fans for first time since coronavirus pandemic hit
THE Community Shield will be played on August 29 – and fans are likely to be allowed into Wembley to watch the game.
The season curtain-raiser is scheduled for the last Saturday in August with Liverpool taking on the winners of this weekend's FA Cup final between Arsenal and Chelsea.
And the FA are a long way down the line in talks with the government to allow supporters to watch the game – the first time any fans will have been back in a football ground since mid-March.
They want the Department for Culture, Media and Sport to give the green light to the match being the maiden test event involving football for the return of fans back in stadiums.
The hope is the green light will be given later this week, which would allow a reduced capacity of around 15,000-20,000 to be present while observing social distancing guidelines.
It would be the first opportunity Liverpool fans could get to celebrate with their players since they were crowned champions earlier this month.
The pilot schemes are really important so we can hit that target of October 1 to open up more sport.
Sports Minister Nigel Huddlestone
And clubs across England will be watching on hoping all will go well as they desperately wait to be able to sell tickets to supporters for games next season.
The government have suggested they would be keen to open up sports events to fans from the start of October, but only after they are satisfied by the outcome of a series of test runs across a number of sports.
Cricket, racing and snooker are the first of those, but football is the key one for the government to get right and the FA believe they have come up with the right proposals to ensure their Community Shield is the match chosen.
Sports Minister Nigel Huddlestone said: "The pilot schemes are really important so we can hit that target of October 1 to open up more sport and get people back in stadia which is what everybody wants.
"We are looking for further testing as the weeks go by but so far so good.
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"We are having discussions at the moment so that we can have more sports involved in the pilot.
"And I think the expectation is it is certainly reasonable to expect rugby and football games to be part of the pilot scheme.
"It is a matter of where and when, but we are having those discussions."