Steve Cooper delivers verdict on stunning Nottingham Forest fightback against QPR

Nottingham Forest produced a stunning comeback as boss Steve Cooper felt QPR simply “couldn’t live with” his side in the second half of a brilliant 3-1 win.

Having fallen behind just before the break, to a goal from Andre Gray, the Reds responded in fine fashion. A Djed Spence screamer got them back on level terms, before Ryan Yates and Brennan Johnson found the net to clinch three points.

It was a fabulous show of fighting spirit from the hosts as they moved to within one point of the play-off spots. And Cooper felt they were well worthy of the victory.

Read more: How the Reds rated against QPR

Read more: Recap live updates from Forest v QPR

“They started a little bit better than us for the first five or 10 minutes. But we were good after that,” he said.

“We were looking like we were going to take the lead and had a couple of near misses. Yatesy got on the end of a couple. I liked us. And then they scored against the run of play. That can derail you, when you’re playing well and go 1-0 down like that. But it didn’t.

“Second half, I thought we were just brilliant. We played with a lot of energy and were high up the pitch, but we kept the ball, created chances and got into good areas. In the end, they just couldn’t live with us.

“We were playing against a team that has been at the top for most of the season. To run over them as we did, create the chances we did and score the goals we did, we were really good for it.

“In the end, we just had too much for them. That’s credit to the lads. We were playing against a team that has been knocking on the top two, never mind staying in the play-offs. We were good tonight.”