Nottingham Forest eased their relegation fears with a shock win over promotion-chasing Birmingham City, but they were indebted to an outstanding late save from goalkeeper Dave Beasant.

Forest, who took a 41st minute lead with an own goal from the unfortunate Darren Purse, had to survive a hectic final 10 minutes.

In this spell a cross into the middle was headed downward by Gary Rowett and Beasant, diving low, pushed the ball up onto the cross bar and away to safety.

It was the first time Birmingham have been on the wrong end of a double this season but they always made hard work of their task against an eager Forest side in which the pace of Alan Rogers was always a major problem.

It was Rogers who gave the first indication of a possible upset when he collected a perfectly judged through ball from Marlon Harewood just inside his own half and raced clear of Birmingham's defenders only to slot his shot just wide of the upright.

Forest were boosted by this incident and with Birmingham's key defenders David Holdsworth and Purse struggling, they made two more determined attempts on the home goal.

Harewood shot wide while Chris Bart-Williams cracked a shot through a packed defence which went inches outside the upright.

But it was a win which proved costly for Forest. While they increased their unbeaten run to three games they also lost the services of their central defender Colin Calderwood.

The Scot was stretchered off in the 55th minute with a broken left ankle after falling awkwardly in a clash with Jon McCarthy.

Birmingham, however, were guilty of many misses. Their attack was sadly off key and the Paul Furlong-Andrew Johnston partnership failed to click on the day.

Furlong was substituted in the second half to be replaced by Dele Adebola but the Nigerian too was also off form when he carelessly tossed aside two gilt-edged chances in the space of three minutes shortly after the Calderwood accident.

But it set up a hectic finale in which Beasant emerged as Forest's shining star with his breathtaking save.

Teams:

Birmingham: Myhre, Rowett, Purse, Holdsworth, Charlton, McCarthy (Marcelo 75), Hughes, Grainger, Lazaridis (Hyde 46), A. Johnson, Furlong (Adebola 51).

Subs Not Used: M. Johnson, Campbell.

Booked: Purse, Holdsworth, A. Johnson.

Nottm Forest: Beasant, Scimeca, Terry, Calderwood (Hjelde 58), Brennan, Prutton, Johnson, Bart-Williams, Rogers, Harewood, Lester.

Subs Not Used: John, Woan, Louis-Jean, Crossley.

Booked: Bart-Williams.

Goals: Purse 40 og.

Att: 23,006

Ref: S Bennett (Orpington).