Diogo Jota might have scored Liverpool’s equaliser against Nottingham Forest, but the forward could not hide his disappointment at only scoring one goal. The Portuguese took just 22 seconds to get his name on the scoresheet, heading home fellow substitute Kostas Tsimikas’ corner moments after coming on.

His fourth goal since returning from injury last month, the 28-year-old now has eight goals for Liverpool this season with three of them coming from his last five appearances.

Yet Jota was also denied by goalkeeper Matz Sels and had an effort cleared off the line, with only Mohamed Salah bettering his total of four shots on goal at the City Ground.

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Jota now boasts seven goals from seven career appearances against Forest, and has only ever scored more against Leicester City and Arsenal.

And while he was pleased to be the scourge of Forest again, he admitted that he was disappointed not to have scored the winner.

“I think it’s just a coincidence,” Jota said of his record against the East Midlands outfit. “Obviously I love to score goals. I scored with my first touch today and obviously that gave the team a bit of momentum.

“I had two more chances, I think I could have given us the three points. Unfortunately, I couldn’t, and [it was] game on.

“It’s a long way [still to go], in the Premier League every ground you go, even at home, it’s always hard. It’s one more point but obviously we wanted the three.”

Introduced alongside Tsimikas in the 65th minute, Jota revealed that he had told the Greek they were going to link up to score before coming on - having previously also done so at the City Ground in an FA Cup quarter-final clash back in March 2022.

“I actually said to him, we were watching the cup goal from two or three years ago where he passed it to me,” he recalled. “And we were on the touchline there and I was just saying, ‘Let’s do it now, recreate your assist, take the corner.’

“It was a goal, it was one of those occasions where everything went right. But like I said, I’m not happy because I think we could have won.”

Meanwhile, having previously played under Forest boss Nuno Espirito Santo and his coaching staff at Wolverhampton Wanderers, Jota also revealed that he had been left cursing goalkeeper Sels when catching up with his former colleagues after the final whistle.

“I was telling that to my previous coaches there at Wolves – I think he made two great saves,” he told TNT Sports. “Obviously you want to do better [in front of goal] but I think he was good as well.”