Crystal Palace FC 3-1 Nottingham Forest FC: Premier League Match Report, 11 October 2026

The four previous meetings between these clubs produced three 1-1 draws, one 1-0 and seven goals between them. This one produced four on its own. Crystal Palace FC 3-1 Nottingham Forest FC, with a half-time score of 2-1, which means the match was open before the interval in a way nothing in the fixture's history suggested it would be.

Palace arrived fifteenth on four points from five games at minus five — close to where they spent the whole of last season, when they finished fifteenth on forty-five points at minus ten. Their start read 0-2 at Everton, 1-4 at home to Manchester City, a 3-2 win at Fulham, 2-3 at home to Ipswich Town and 0-0 at Leeds. Two home matches, two defeats, seven goals conceded in them.

Forest were thirteenth on five points from the same five at minus one, having finished sixteenth last season on forty-four. Their oddity was geographical: all four of the goals they had scored came away from home, in a 2-2 at Liverpool and a 2-1 win at Aston Villa, while three home matches had produced 0-1 to Leeds, 0-0 with Tottenham and 0-1 to Coventry and no goals at all.

The half-time score therefore undid both patterns at once. Palace, who had taken nothing from their two home games, had two goals by the break. Forest, who had managed to score only on their travels, had one of their own and were a goal behind rather than out of it.

This round was played while the site was standing still, which is why there is no preview of it in the archive and nothing here to grade. The account above comes from the scoreline, the half-time split and the table as it stood on the morning of the match.

Palace went from four points to seven and from minus five to minus three, and collected their first home win and their first home points of the season at the third attempt. These two finished last season a single point apart, forty-five to forty-four, so early margins of this size are not detail between them — they are the whole gap.

Forest stayed on five points while their goal difference slid from minus one to minus three. The more awkward part is that the one thing working for them stopped working: two away trips had brought four points and four goals, and the third brought a three-goal concession and nothing. Their home scoring problem was still unsolved, and now the away form that had covered for it had a blemish too.

Six games spread over seven weeks, with an international break sitting in the middle of them, is not yet a season. What the afternoon settled is narrower and real enough: Palace have points at home at last, Forest are not yet a side that scores anywhere except on the road, and the quietest fixture on either club's recent calendar is no longer quiet.