Crystal Palace 0-2 Liverpool: James Milner penalty and Sadio Mane clincher help Jurgen Klopp's men battle past 10-man Eagles and keep up 100 per cent start to the new season

This game was pretty much over a few seconds before the end of the first-half. Liverpool may only have led by a single goal at that point, but it had been scored from the penalty spot by James Milner. Stats nerds know what happens when Milner scores in the Premier League. His team do not lose. Not once, not ever.

Milner has found the net 48 times in the Premier League, across 47 games. The end result: 37 wins, and ten draws. So full credit to Crystal Palace for trying their damnedest to overcome the inevitable, but history favoured three points for Liverpool from that moment.

The home fans felt hard done by over the penalty and their mood will not have improved when local hero Aaron Wan-Bissaka was sent off for tripping the man they saw as the villain of the piece,Mohamed Salah, but Liverpool were good for their win in the end. Roy Hodgson has Crystal Palace sorted out now, and Selhurst Park will be a difficult visit for even the Premier League’s finest teams. 

MATCH FACTS, PLAYER RATINGS AND MATCH ZONE 

Crystal Palace: Hennessey, Wan-Bissaka, Tomkins, Sakho, van Aanholt, Townsend (Ward 79), Milivojevic, McArthur, Schlupp (Meyer 83), Benteke (Sorloth 71), Zaha

Subs not used: Ayew, Kouyate, Guaita, Kelly

Booked: van Aanholt

Sent off: Wan-Bissaka 

Liverpool: Alisson, Alexander-Arnold, Gomez, van Dijk, Robertson, Keita (Lallana 87), Wijnaldum, Milner (Henderson 67), Salah, Firmino (Sturridge 90), Mane

Subs not used: Moreno, Mignolet, Shaqiri, Matip

Goalscorers: Milner pen 45, Mane 90

Booked: Alexander-Arnold 

Referee: Michael Oliver

So Liverpool have laid down a marker for the likes of Manchester City – and maybe others – to follow by winning here. They won’t be worried by the slender margin, either. Liverpool’s strikers may be prolific but Palace are hard to break down and lightning quick on the counter-attack, mainly through Wilfried Zaha.

Wan-Bissaka is a star in the making, too, and beneath the gaze of Gareth Southgate was impressing, right up to the moment the rashness of youth curtailed his evening. There were 15 minutes to go when Roberto Firmino put Salah away, and he outstripped Palace’s back four to tear on goal. Wan-Bissaka set off in pursuit but getting there was always a desperately tall order, even for one so fast.

A wiser head would have left it for goalkeeper Wayne Hennessey to deal with, stayed alert to being first to any rebound, and what will be, will be. Wan-Bissaka tried his luck. He clipped Salah in full flow, the results were spectacular, and referee Michael Oliver had no option but to brandish a red card.

The only saving grace was that contact came outside the area and Liverpool did nothing with the free-kick. It was a sad end to Wan-Bissaka’s night, though. He was shown a red card playing for England under-20s, too, and it a record that belies his enormous talent.

As Crystal Palace searched in vain for an equaliser, the inevitable happened. Virgil van Dijk won a mighty header – one of many – from a Palace corner, Salah sped away on the break and put Sadio Mane in. He stayed upright after another desperate challenge from Patrick Van Aanholt, rounded Hennessey and pushed the ball into an empty net. Follow that. They will all have to, and it won’t be easy. 

There is a reason Liverpool traded Mamadou Sakho and it was there in the 44th minute. Crystal Palace having worked like stink to take Liverpool to half-time goalless, Sakho chucked it away with the last attack before the whistle. The home fans fumed and raged and cried cheat at Mohamed Salah and Michael Oliver, the referee, but it was a foul that did the damage, not a dive – and the official saw it clearly and reacted without question.

Roberto Firmino threaded the ball into Salah, as he had been looking to do throughout, and Sakho had a couple of nibbles before the fateful trip. He was trying to get the ball, but it was clumsy and always likely to end in calamity. Salah was preparing to shoot but tumbled instead. Maybe he exaggerated the fall, but not the foul.

James Milner stepped up and in front of a raucous home end, stuck the ball smartly past Wayne Hennessey for the lead Liverpool deserved. It wouldn’t be right to say Salah has never dived – he did so against Chelsea towards the end of last season, and Jurgen Klopp called him on it, very publically. It wasn’t a ruse but it might have helped Salah, long term. He would be a fool to anger his manager a second time and if referees are paying attention they would know that. Maybe it helped swing the decision.

Palace will have felt doubly unfortunate having had the best chance of the first 45 minutes. No-one would argue they had the better of the play, but when Naby Keita gave the ball away, it set Andros Townsend up on the right. He cut inside, sized up the target and his a fantastic dipping shot that defeated Alisson but not the bar. It was a rare opportunity.

Crystal Palace have some outstanding athletes – not least Wilfried Zaha, Jeffrey Schlupp and right-back Aaron Wan-Bissaka, who cannot fail to have impressed watching England manager Gareth Southgate – but mostly they were pre-occupied containing Liverpool. All, on occasions, went on powerful runs, but Palace did not have the numbers committed to attack to make that count. Liverpool are organised, too, and at last have the defensive strength to support the wit of their forwards.

Not that they got much joy out of Palace; impressively organised as they have been for some while now by Roy Hodgson. It took 19 minutes for Liverpool to get close to a breakthrough when Sadio Mane broke to the by-line, only to be thwarted by a quite splendid tackle from Wan-Bissaka. 

Soon after, Sakho passed directly to Keita, who almost put Salah in; a portent of the calamity to come, perhaps. Mane knocked the stuffing out of Hennessey with an aerial challenge after 21 minutes so it was perhaps just as well that a minute later, when Salah was put through by Keita, his lob did not test the goalkeeper but flew harmlessly over the bar and into the crowd behind the goal.

Hennessey had fully recovered four minutes later when Liverpool mounted their next attack. Salah’s shot was blocked but Keita was first onto the rebound and Hennessey tipped the ball round at his near post. The crowd were already puzzlingly incensed by a booking for Patrick Van Aanholt who clamped Milner’s legs in a tackle, so once the penalty was given it was open season on the officials, and Liverpool’s Salah.

One of the biggest cheers of the night came after 49 minutes when, put through by Andrew Robertson, he took the ball too wide rounding Hennessey and had to double back instead of going for goal. Having kept the ball in play, he fed Keita, but his shot went wide of the target to the accompaniment of more mockery.

Sarcastic support then followed the award of a free-kick, and a yellow card, against Trent Alexander-Arnold for a foul on Zaha. Luka Milivojevic curled it over the wall, forcing the first save of the night from Alisson.