Wolves 0-2 Nottingham Forest: Championship leaders stunned

New Nottingham Forest manager Aitor Karanka secured his first win with a stunning 2-0 victory against runaway Sky Bet Championship leaders Wolves at Molineux.

Goals from Kieran Dowell, his 10th of the season, and Ben Osborn in the final five minutes of the first half ended Wolves' 13-game unbeaten run in the league. It was Forest's first Championship win in seven games after taking only two points from the previous six matches.

The victory also extended Karanka's amazing run when facing Wolves. The former Middlesbrough boss has now won his last five games against them.

Despite suffering only their second home defeat of the season, Wolves can take some comfort from still being nine points clear at the top of the table.

Diogo Jota had threatened to give Wolves the perfect start in the ninth minute only to see his curling right-footed shot fly inches past goalkeeper Jordan Smith's far post.

Jota then found himself involved in a rather more painful moment, being upended in the 19th minute by Joe Worrall, earning the centre-half a booking and Forest their second yellow card following an earlier caution for Danny Fox after his foul on Ivan Cavaleiro. Liam Bridcutt became the third Forest player to be booked after he blocked the run of Ruben Neves.

Wolves' frustration at failing to break down Forest was then magnified when on-loan Everton marksman Dowell broke the deadlock - thanks to a large deflection.

After Osborn's shot had been deflected out for a corner, Wolves failed to fully clear his cross and the ball fell invitingly to Dowell 20 yards out. His deflected drive completely wrong-footed goalkeeper John Ruddy in the 40th minute.

Wolves were still reeling from that setback when the impressive Osborn doubled Forest's advantage three minutes later. Forest capitalised after Wolves allowed a cross from Matty Cash to flash across the area. It flew straight to Osborn, who scored with a rising drive into the roof of the net from 14 yards out which gave Ruddy no chance.

In a bid to get back into the game, Wolves took off full-backs Matt Doherty and Barry Douglas at half-time and replaced them with the attacking duo of Helder Costa and Morgan Gibbs-White.

But they were fortunate not to fall further behind only five minutes into the second half. They were saved by Ruddy, who fingertipped a header from Fox over the bar after a neat cross from Dowell as Forest eventually eased to a deserved win.

The managers

Nuno: "I'm responsible, maybe for not telling the boys that there's still a long way to go and no-body can relax here. With a bad performance comes a bad result.

"And I think it was one of the games where we were not as good as we should have been. Nothing to do with the opponent who didn't create anything, we should have done better. But we knew that this day could come."

Aitor Karanka: "To win here is good, but the most important thing is the performance. I told the players after the game that the crowd can now go home feeling proud of their players.

"It has been a really good performance and it is not easy to win here. The most important thing has been the commitment of everyone."

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