Núñez Liverpool’s hero after stoppage-time strike floors Nottingham Forest

This game, in truth, only really came alive in second-half stoppage time. Then, 36 seconds over the initial eight minutes of added time, bedlam ensued. Darwin Núñez, who arrived on the hour, leapt high to meet Alexis Mac Allister’s dinked cross and generated just enough power to drop a header inside a post, a priceless winner in Liverpool’s bid to win the Premier League. Jürgen Klopp was mobbed by Adrián and the rest of Liverpool’s substitutes flooded the pitch.

For Nottingham Forest, deserving of a crucial point in their fight to avoid relegation, it was a thoroughly demoralising end to a frenetic finale. By the end, this game had turned bad-tempered, the referee, Paul Tierney, heading down the tunnel to a wall of boos from the angry home support, seconds after sending off Steven Reid, Forest’s first-team coach. Soon after the final whistle Evangelos Marinakis, the Forest owner, was among those pitch-side in disbelief at what had unfolded.

For so long, it seemed at the end of Klopp’s long Liverpool farewell that this would be one of the few grounds he could not consider a happy hunting ground. Ryan Yates, the Forest captain who crouched on all fours at the final whistle, made a superb block to deny Núñez in the 90th minute and Matz Sels did brilliantly to prevent Murillo’s clearance from dropping in at a corner on 95 minutes. With Manchester City not in action until Sunday in the derby, Liverpool were – late on – able to stretch their legs and move four points clear at the top of the pile. Liverpool’s last league win here was in 1984, when Ian Rush and Ronnie Whelan were on the scoresheet.

As Guns N’ Roses’ Welcome to the Jungle blared as the teams emerged from the tunnel, Klopp high-fiving Nuno Espírito Santo on the touchline, suddenly the nature of the tight schedule – this was both teams’ seventh game in 27 days – felt rather pronounced. Three days since both did battle in the FA Cup, six since Liverpool lifted the Carabao Cup at Wembley. It also seemed strange to watch Liverpool’s team bus reverse into position at the City Ground – amid much commotion – in preparation for a 3 o’clock kick-off, this only their third of the season, in part due to their Europa League success, with a last-16 first-leg meeting at Sparta Prague in the diary for Thursday.

Klopp made four changes from the team that overcame Southampton to reach the FA Cup quarter-finals in midweek, with Ibrahima Konaté, Mac Allister, Andy Robertson and Luis Díaz returning to the starting lineup. Bobby Clark made his first top-flight start in a three-man midfield alongside Joe Gomez and Mac Allister. For Klopp, there were a couple of familiar faces in the Forest XI in Neco Williams, who spent 15 years on the books at Anfield, and Divock Origi, for ever a Liverpool cult hero for his goals en route to lifting the Champions League in 2019. Another later arrived off the bench – Taiwo Awoniyi, who scored the only goal in this fixture last season.

It was Williams and Origi who combined in the seconds after kick-off, the former feeding Origi who lured Virgil van Dijk, the Liverpool captain, into conceding an early corner. Origi operated off the Forest right and, five minutes after flashing the game’s first shot wide after bumping off the challenges of Robertson and Gomez, he slipped Anthony Elanga in on goal but he was thwarted by Caoimhin Kelleher. Elanga – just about – beat Van Dijk in a foot race but an alert Kelleher saved with his left foot and while Konaté and Van Dijk looked along the line at the assistant referee Richard West to flag Elanga offside, such redemption never arrived.

Until then, Liverpool’s best effort was a Díaz shot that cannoned off the right boot of the Forest defender Andrew Omobamidele and into the side netting. Omobamidele’s centre-back partner, Murillo, also made a superb block to prevent Díaz from stabbing the ball in from inside the six-yard box.

It was hardly a vintage Liverpool display but there was a sense that Forest were waiting for the visitors to turn the screw. Omobamidele diverted a Robertson effort clear of goal after Nicolás Dominguez prevented Conor Bradley’s cross from landing at the feet of Díaz on the penalty spot. Then Núñez and Wataru Endo entered from the bench. Núñez stretched his legs with his first touches, haring down the left channel, but Omobamidele tracked him all the way to the goalline and later rattled a shot against the side netting. Núñez, though, had the final say.