<figure id="attachment_3221377" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-3221377" style="width: 1600px" class="wp-caption alignnone"><img loading="lazy" class="size-full wp-image-3221377" src="https://media.freemalaysiatoday.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/ee232748-nottingham-forest-1.jpg" alt="Nottingham Forest" width="1600" height="1000" /><figcaption id="caption-attachment-3221377" class="wp-caption-text">Nottingham Forest&#8217;s Nikola Milenkovic (No 31) scores from close range for the third goal against Malmo at the City Ground. (Nottingham Forest pic)</figcaption></figure>
BACKA TOPOLA: Olympique Lyonnais went top of the Europa League standings with a 6-0 victory against Maccabi Tel Aviv with Corentina Tolisso netting a hattrick, while in-form Nottingham Forest made light work of Malmo in a comfortable 3-0 home win.
Real Betis moved up to fifth with a 2-1 victory over visiting Utrecht and Rangers earned their first point but let a lead slip to draw 1-1 with 10-man Braga.
Lyon are on 12 points, level with second-placed Midtjylland, who lost 2-1 at AS Roma, and Aston Villa, who beat Young Boys by the same scoreline in the earlier games.
The French side took the lead in the fourth minute with Abner Vinicius tapping in at the back post after Maccabi failed to deal with a ball across the six-yard box at the TSC Arena in Serbia.
Tolisso nodded in a cross floated to the far post to double the lead after 25 minutes and 10 minutes later Moussa Niakhate converted a penalty after Sagiv Jehezkel fouled Pavel Sulc.
Lyon captain Tolisso scored two in quick succession after the break and Adam Karabec wrapped up the win just past the hour mark. Maccabi, who had Jehezkel sent off in added time, are second-bottom with one point.
Forest flying on all front
Forest manager Sean Dyche made seven changes to the side that started Saturday&#8217;s 3-0 win in the Premier League at Liverpool, yet the hosts had little trouble against Swedish visitors Malmo who offered very little going forward.
The sides had met in the 1979 European Cup final, won 1-0 by Forest, and at the City Ground on Thursday the hosts strolled to their third consecutive win in all competitions and moved up to 16th in the standings on eight points.
After a rather flat opening, Nikola Milenkovic&#8217;s attempted cross was blocked and the ball fell for Ryan Yates whose first-time finish flew past goalkeeper Melker Ellborg to give Forest the lead in the 27th minute.
Forest then went in search of a second, Ellborg parrying away a powerful shot from Arnaud Kalimuendo and Milenkovic&#8217;s header from the resulting corner brought another save.
A second goal was coming though and, after Yates&#8217; header was saved, Kalimuendo was there to hook the rebound into the net and score his first Forest goal one minute before halftime.
Forest were cruising and after Malmo failed to clear a corner, the ball dropped to Milenkovic who made no mistake from close range to put them three up in the 59th minute before the hosts took their foot off the brake with the job done.
Rangers, who began the day rooted to the bottom of the table, took the lead in added time at the end of the first half with James Tavernier converting from the penalty spot.
Braga had Rodrigo Zalazar sent off in the 61st minute but the visitors drew level eight minutes later when Gabri Martinez capitalised on a poor attempted headed clearance in the box. Rangers had Mohamed Diomande sent off deep into added time.
Betis went two goals up with Cucho Hernandez and Abde Ezzalzouli netting either side of the break before Utrecht pulled one back 10 minutes into the second half.
Miguel Rodriguez spotted Betis keeper Alvaro Valles off his line and tried his luck from just inside the opposition half to stun the hosts but they held on and are on 11 points.

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