By Richard Martin
MANCHESTER, England (Reuters) – Struggling Nottingham Forest pulled off a stunning 1-0 win over Liverpool to claim only their second victory of the season in the Premier League on Saturday while Manchester City and Everton also enjoyed comfortable home wins.
Nigerian forward Taiwo Awoniyi got the only goal of the game in Nottingham in the second half when he followed up his own shot to score from close range, coming back to haunt Liverpool after joining the club in 2015 but never playing a competitive game for them.
Forest goalkeeper Dean Henderson made an impressive save deep in added time to keep out a header from Virgil van Dijk, securing his side’s first win since they beat West Ham United on Aug. 14, while Liverpool sank to a third defeat of the season.
The result brought Liverpool back down to earth after last week’s 1-0 win over Manchester City and another 1-0 success over West Ham in midweek and underlined Juergen Klopp’s side’s struggles away from home this season, with only two points from five matches on their travels.
“Massive, massive blow because I have no idea how we can lose this game to be honest,” Klopp said.
“The performance I can kind of explain, the result not. We had to put the game to bed to be perfectly honest.”
Forest coach Steve Cooper said: “This is a big win but only a win. We’ve got to build on that and carry on. To win a game against someone like Liverpool, you need to have very good moments at both ends. We’ve done that today.”
Liverpool are seventh in the standings on 16 points after 11 matches, 11 behind leaders Arsenal, who visit Southampton on Sunday.
Champions City reduced the gap with Arsenal to one point as two goals from Erling Haaland and one from Kevin De Bruyne secured a 3-1 win over Brighton & Hove Albion.
Haaland used his strength to win a physical battle with Brighton’s Adam Webster and score the opening goal, then converted from the penalty spot for the second.
Brighton, who had a courageous game plan and pressed City deep in their own half, pulled back a goal through Leandro Trossard before De Bruyne made sure of the three points.
Everton halted a run of three successive defeats by recording their biggest win of the season, beating Crystal Palace 3-0 thanks to goals from Dominic Calvert-Lewin, Anthony Gordon and Dwight McNeil and moving up to 11th in the standings.
(Reporting by Richard Martin; editing by Clare Fallon)
