NOTTINGHAM, England: Nottingham Forest stunned Liverpool as Taiwo Awoniyi sealed a 1-0 win with a second-half goal to lift the Midlands club off the bottom of the Premier League table on Saturday.
A below-par Liverpool, seeking a third consecutive league win, could have few complaints as Forest produced a superb performance to earn their second win of the season.
Juergen Klopp’s side were off the pace in the first half as a disciplined Forest side knocked them out of their rhythm.
Forest went ahead in the 55th minute when Awoniyi poached a rebound after his initial effort struck the post.
The hosts were dangerous on the counter-attack and had several chances to give themselves some breathing space.
But they were indebted to keeper Dean Henderson who made a series of saves, the best coming in stoppage time when he somehow kept out a sensational close-range header by Virgil van Dijk from a corner.
Forest held on and moved to 19th place with nine points from 12 games, one ahead of Leicester City. A third league defeat of the season leaves Liverpool still in seventh place, 11 points adrift of leaders Arsenal and having played a game more.
Klopp was left scratching his head after the match, saying Liverpool wasted several gilt-edged chances.
Van Dijk was one of the worst culprits, squandering two great opportunities in addition to having his header in stoppage time saved by Henderson.
“The performance I can kind of explain, the result not to be honest. I never saw a game where one team has four or five no-brainers from a set piece where we have to finish it off,” Klopp said. “We had to put the game to bed to be perfectly honest.”
