Key events
Championship: Crikey! It’s Sunderland 2-0 Burnley at the Stadium of Light where Dan Neil has extended the home side’s lead with a sweet left-footed half-volley. Have that, Vincent!
Championship: The goals are flying in at Loftus Road, where QPR lead Wigan 2-1. Sam Field opened the scoring for QPR, Nathan Broadhead equalised for the visitors and almost immediately, Leon Balogun restored the league leaders’ advantage.
Premier League: Manchester City 1-0 Brighton (Haaland 22)
Premier League: Erling Haaland scores his 16th Premier League goal of the season, latching on to a dirty long ball from Ederson, knocking Adam Webster out of his way and scoring past Robert Sanchez.
Manchester City 0-0 Brighton: Erling Haaland is brought down by a Robert Sanchez ankle-tap for as blatant a penalty as you’ll ever see. Referee Craig Pawson doesn’t give it and neither does his VAR Lee Mason. That is astonishing!
Championship: Unbeaten in 12 Championship games, Burnley trail Sunderland to an Amad Diallo goal on 16 minutes. Meanwhile at Ewood Park, Blackburn lead Birmingham City courtesy of a goal from Sam Gallagher.
Championship: Teemu Pukki scores his and Norwich City’s second goal of the game against Sheffield United after being put through on goal by a ball over the top from Max Aarons. He got the better of John Egan before slotting the ball past Adam Davies.
GOAL! Everton 1-0 Crystal Palace (Calvert-Lewin 11)
Premier League: Dominic Calvert-Lewin reminds the watching Gareth Southgate of his credentials with a fine finish for Everton, who have dominated Crystal Palace in the early stages.
Scottish Premiership: North Macedonia international Bojan Miovski gives Aberdeen an early lead at Motherwell.
Scottish Premiership: An already great day for Celtic has just got a little bit better. Hosting Livingstone at Ibrox, Rangers have gone a goal down with Jon Nouble shooting on the turn for the visitors after four minutes.
Championship: Teemu Pukki takes advantage of a mistake from Sheffield United goalkeeper Adam Davies to give Norwich City an early lead at Bramall Lane. In for Wes Foderingham, who is suspended, Davies’s attempted clearance went in off the Norwich striker.
Match report: Nottingham Forest 1-0 Liverpool
Premier League: “For Nottingham Forest, this was one of those spectacular occasions worth the long wait,” writes Ben Fisher from the City Ground. “After 23 years outside the top flight, how they enjoyed giving Jürgen Klopp’s Liverpool a bloody nose.”
WSL match report: Tottenham Hotspur 0-3 Manchester City
WSL: Bunny Shaw’s brace and another goal from Lauren Hemp helped Manchester City make it back-to-back wins in the Women’s Super League with a 3-0 victory at Tottenham.
Scottish Premiership: Celtic held off a late Hearts onslaught to win by the odd goal of seven in a bonkers game at Tynecastle. They stretch their lead at the top of the table to five points.
WSL: Following hot on the heels of Manchester City’s 3-0 win over Tottenham at Brisbane Road, Everton have beaten Aston Villa. Their skipper Lucy Graham scored the only goal of the game at the Bescot Stadium.
Championship: Blackpool have won their big Lancashire derby against Preston by a scoreline of 4-2, with Jerry Yates scoring two goals to help his side up to 17th in the table.
Full time: Nottingham Forest 1-0 Liverpool
Premier League: A quite astonishing Dean Henderson save in added time secured all three points for Forest, who win courtesy of Taiwo Awoniyi’s second half strike. Forest leapfrog Leicester and go second from bottom, while Liverpool stay seventh, 11 points behind league leaders Arsenal having played one game more.
Hearts 3-4 Celtic: Celtic have retaken the lead at Tynecastle, where Greg Taylor has just scored the seventh goal of an astonishing game with a far post finish.
Everton v Crystal Palace line-ups
Everton: Pickford, Coleman, Tarkowski, Coady, Mykolenko, Onana, Gueye, Gordon, Iwobi, Gray, Calvert-Lewin.
Subs: Begovic, Holgate, Keane, McNeil, Doucoure, Maupay, Davies, Rondon, Garner
Crystal Palace: Guaita, Ward, Andersen, Guehi, Mitchell, Milivojevic, Eze, Olise, Ayew, Edouard, Zaha.
Subs: Johnstone, Tomkins, Mateta, Schlupp, Hughes, Ebiowei, Balmer, Riedewald, Phillips.
Manchester City v Brighton line-ups
Manchester City: Ederson, Cancelo, Akanji, Dias, Laporte, De Bruyne, Rodri, Grealish, Silva, Mahrez, Haaland.
Subs: Moreno, Stones, Ake, Gundogan, Alvarez, Gomez, Foden, Palmer, Lewis.
Brighton: Sanchez, Veltman, Dunk, Webster, Gross, Mac Allister, Caicedo, Trossard, March, Lallana, Welbeck.
Subs: Steele, Lamptey, Colwill, Sarmiento, Enciso, Undav, Gilmour, Van Hecke, Estupinan.
Meanwhile in Scotland II: It’s now 3-3 between Hearts and Celtic in an absolute ding-dong at Tynecastle. Daizen Maeda put Celtic 3-2 up before Lawrence Shankland scored a retaken penalty for Hearts to get his hat-trick.
Meanwhile in Scotland: It’s 2-2 between Hearts and Celtic with a little over 30 minutes to go. On as a first half sub, Lawrence Shankland scored a quick-fire double either side of half-time, cancelling out James Forrest’s opener before sending his side ahead. Giorgios Giakoumakis restored parity for Celtic on the 55-minute mark.
GOAL! Nottingham Forest 1-0 Liverpool (Awoniyi 56)
Forest have taken the lead! Selected today ahead of Brennan Johnson, Taiwo Awoniyi has fired his side ahead against Liverpool. Rob Smyth has the latest from the City Ground …
Women’s Super League
There are two games in the women’s top flight today and the first of them has just ended with a Manchester City win over Tottenham Hotspur at Brisbane Road. A brace from Bunny Shaw and one from Lauren Hemp secured a 3-0 win for City, while Tottenham Hotspur lost Ellie Brazil to what looked like quite a serious injury in the first half. We wish her all the best. In today’s other game, it’s scoreless between Aston Villa and Everton at half-time.
Scottish Premiership
With a two point lead over Rangers at the top of the table, Celtic travelled to Tynecastle for this afternoon’s early kick-off against Hearts. The reigning champions went ahead courtesy of James Forrest’s opener on 15 minutes but substitute Lawrence Shankland equalised for Hearts in added time at the end of the first half.
Rangers host sixth-placed Livingston at 3pm in one of five Scottish Premiership matches being played today. Stuck in a three-way mire along with Dundee United at the bottom of the table with nine points each, Kilmarnock and Ross County go toe to toe in a relegation six-pointer.
Scottish Premiership fixtures
Championship
QPR are the somewhat surprising leaders of the Championship and received quite the boost in midweek when their manager Michael Beale rejected overtures from Wolves to stay at Loftus Road. They host Wigan Athletic this afternoon, while Blackburn Rovers, joint top but behind QPR on goal difference, welcome Birmingham City to Ewood Park.
Already five points adrift of safety at the bottom of the table, Huddersfield go to Middlesbrough, while Blackpool are hosting Preston in a big Lancashire derby that kicked off earlier. It’s 1-1 at Bloomfield Road at half-time after Preston’s Ben Whiteman cancelled out Jerry Yates’s opener for Blackpool.
Today’s Championship fixtures
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Blackpool 1-1 Preston (latest)
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Blackburn Rovers v Birmingham City
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Middlesbrough v Huddersfield Town
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Millwall v West Brom
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QPR v Wigan
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Reading v Bristol City
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Rotherham United v Hull City
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Sheffield United v Norwich City
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Stoke City v Coventry City
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Sunderland v Burnley
Premier League
It’s scoreless at half-time at the City Ground, where a win for Liverpool over Nottingtham Forerst will send Jürgen Klopp’s side fifth, while victory for the hosts would take them above Leicester City but leave them second from bottom of the table.
Three points behind Palace, Everton could overtake their visitors with a comprehensive thrashing by four goals or more, while Roberto De Zerbi is still looking to mastermind his first win as Brighton manager in five attempts and will do exceptionally well to do so at Manchester City.
Referees and the abuse they face
“It is only a matter of time before we see a British referee killed if no action is taken to try and stamp [player and spectator abuse] out,” says Dr Jamie Cleland, an academic who conducts research into socio-cultural issues in sport. “It has happened in other countries so why will it not happen here? We should not be naive about this.” Paul MacInnes reports …
Saturday clockwatch …
A hectic midweek schedule for the top flight means there are just four Premier League matches being played today, and it was Nottingham Forest and Liverpool who got the action under way in the lunchtime kick-off at the City Ground. Looking for their first win in nine games, Forest …
Hosting Brighton at the Etihad Stadium, a win for Manchester City against a team that has played quite well but failed to score in their past three games would send them to within a point of league leaders Arsenal for the evening. The Gunners travel to Southampton for one of five top flight games being played tomorrowe afternoon.
In today’s other three o’clock kick-off, Everton host Crystal Palace, who travel to Goodison Park on the back of their impressive midweek win against Wolves. Exciting going forward but a little porous at the back, Palace have yet to win on the road in the league this season.
Outside of the Premier League we have plenty of EFL and Scottish Premiership action to keep tabs on, so stay tuned for team news, updates on all the goals as they go in and all the rest of the day’s major talking points.