Erling Haaland scored twice to take his Premier League tally to nine as Manchester City recovered from conceding after just 23 seconds to maintain their 100% record with victory over Brentford.
Visiting forward Yoane Wissa scored the quickest top-flight goal of the season, heading into an empty net from close range after John Stones and Ederson inexplicably messed up attempting to clear Keane Lewis-Potter’s nod-back.
City were rocking but Haaland steadied the ship, driving home the loose ball after Kevin de Bruyne had been tackled inside the Brentford box.
The Norwegian was playing despite the death of a close family friend in midweek. He scored a second before the break as he outmuscled Ethan Pinnock to reach Ederson’s long punt forward.
It left Haaland tantalisingly close to becoming only the fifth player in English top-flight history – and the first since 1946 – to score three successive hat-tricks.
He came close. Brentford keeper Mark Flekken tipped one goal-bound effort over the bar. Haaland then sent an instinctive first-time strike against the post and was unable to get enough power behind the rebound to take it into the net.
But, despite the crowd clearly willing him on, dad Alfie watching from the stands and Manager Pep Guardiola opting not to take him off even though his side start their Champions League campaign with a 2023 final rematch against Inter Milan on Wednesday, this time Haaland had to settle for two.
As the game ticked into injury time, Haaland was confirmed as the club man of the match.
He has now taken his overall tally for City to 99 in 103 appearances. His Premier League ratio is more than one a game.
To put that into context, legendary striker Sergio Aguero took 390 games to score his club record 260 for the club. At the current rate, Haaland will overhaul the Argentine within three seasons.
And the secondary point is he scores goals from nothing, which, on days like these, is absolutely priceless.
Callum Hudson-Odoi and unbeaten Nottingham Forest stunned Liverpool at Anfield to end Arne Slot’s perfect start as Reds boss.
The substitute cut in from the left and curled an inch-perfect shot into the far bottom corner, which Alisson could not reach.
This was their first win at Liverpool in any competition since 1969.
The home side’s confidence was high at Anfield coming into the game after three wins out of three without conceding a goal.
And Liverpool had the better chances, certainly in the first half.
The hosts went closest before the break when Luis Diaz chased a lost cause, cut in and hammered a shot against the near post from a tight angle.
Forest keeper Matz Sels pulled off a good save to keep out an Alexis Mac Allister header and got lucky moments later when he almost spilled Diaz’s effort into his own net.
But Forest did create more after the break, with Morgan Gibbs-White and Anthony Elanga shooting off target before Hudson-Odoi’s beauty.
Forest fans were jubilant and the Liverpool support tried to get their team going, but they did not fashion many clear chances to equalise.
The visitors move into fourth spot in the fledgling Premier League table with two wins and two draws. Liverpool are two places and one point above them.
Forest boss Nuno Espirito Santo deserves huge credit for their start to the season.
All the talk was of Liverpool’s unbeaten start under Slot – but Forest had not lost a Premier League game either.
And now they are the unbeaten ones.
Their first-half performance was solid and unspectacular. They frustrated Liverpool but did not have a single shot before the break.
However, Nuno was brave in the second half, bringing on Hudson-Odoi and Elanga when the temptation might have been to shore things up – and it paid off.
Elanga found Hudson-Odoi, who cut inside Conor Bradley before swinging in his sweet shot into the bottom corner.
Elanga almost doubled their lead late on when he shot straight at Alisson.
But one goal was enough, and they won at Anfield for the first time since the first man landed on the Moon.
Former Feyenoord boss Slot will have known it would not all be plain sailing in the Premier League.
But the start he had, including the hugely impressive win over Manchester United before the international break, had people favourably comparing his set-up to Jurgen Klopp’s.
Patience, passing and build-up is their style now. And for a while, it looked like their patience would eventually be rewarded.
Diaz hit the post, several headers went off target, and Mohamed Salah forced a good save from Sels at his near post.
Slot brought on Bradley, pushing Trent Alexander-Arnold into midfield, and introduced Cody Gakpo and Darwin Nunez as he tried to find the winner.
But in the end, Bradley was beaten for the only goal of the game.
The hosts had one late chance to level when Virgil van Dijk headed over, but many fans were leaving Anfield before the final whistle went to confirm the end of their unbeaten start.
Source: BBC football
