Latest Nottingham Forest news as Vitor Pereira's Reds beaten 1-0 by Liverpool in Premier League clash at the City Ground
16:44, 22 Feb 2026Updated 16:51, 22 Feb 2026
Nottingham Forest manager, Vitor Pereira
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Nottingham Forest manager, Vitor Pereira(Image: Photo by James Holyoak/MB Media/Getty Images)
Head coach Vitor Pereira believes Nottingham Forest can take confidence from their impressive performance against Liverpool, despite suffering a gut-wrenching 1-0 defeat.
The Reds dominated against the reigning Premier League champions in the first half at the City Ground. And although they came under more pressure after the break, they looked on course to claim a big point as time ticked on.
When Alexis Mac Allister had a goal ruled out for handball at the death, that should have been that for Forest. But instead, the Liverpool man popped up again deep into added time.
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VAR was deployed for the second time, to check for a potential offside, but this time ruled Mac Allister’s goal should stand. It was a real kick in the teeth for Pereira’s men in their battle to avoid relegation.
"It's special the situation, five guys in the far post,” Pereira said of the winner. “But this is something where the organisation must be from them in the inside of the pitch.
“That's one thing where I'm sad. One point was not enough. Zero? We don't deserve this. If they play the way they played in the first half, we can get a lot of points until the end.”
The Reds are just two points above the bottom three with 11 games to go. A failure to capitalise on their good play before the break came back to haunt them in Pereira’s first league game at the helm.
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Forest had gone into the game with confidence high after beating Fenerbahce 3-0 on Thursday night. That result in Turkey means they have one foot in the last 16 of the Europa League ahead of the upcoming play-off second leg, but they still have work to do to secure survival in the top flight.
"It's football. It's football,” said the Portuguese, who was appointed as Sean Dyche’s replacement a week ago. “We played the first half in a fantastic way, creating problems. And we deserved to score two or three goals because we had two or three big chances to score.
"But of course, we played three days ago against a team without a game in the middle of the week. Our capacity to press them was not the same.
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"And in the end, we concede. It's football. We need to accept it, difficult to accept the frustration. But the supporters were fantastic. The next day and game, we will be stronger.”
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