Liam Delap emphatically announced himself as Nottingham Forest’s number nine with a brace against Manchester City.

After months of pain and not scoring a goal at home, Nottingham Forest finally got the season started on Saturday against Manchester City. Forest beat City 3-1 with a clinical, counter-attacking display that Liam Delap was fronting.

It was the Delap that we all saw at Ipswich Town. He was aggressive, direct, confident, and his finishing was absolutely lethal. Delap only really had two chances, and he struck both with so much pace and venom that Gianluigi Donnarumma couldn’t even get close.

The second in particular was breathtaking, striking with his left foot, across goal, hitting the post and then flying in. It was an incredible effort from Delap, but in the build-up to this goal, he had a moment equally impressive.

Liam Delap did something so impressive alongside his two goals vs Manchester City

Delap had the best night of his career thus far on Saturday, scoring twice against his old club and breathing life into the Oliver Glasner project, at long last, with his finishing out of this world. Both goals were exactly what he thrives on. Delap loves quick transitions, and both goals were a direct result of this

This is the player who impressed at Ipswich and earned the transfer to Chelsea, and it looks as though Forest now have that player. But it isn’t just the finishing, as he has been failing to shine in his link-up play as well this season.

But for his second goal, Delap did something great. Back to goal, Delap took a sublime flick to get the ball to Morgan Gibbs-White before he spun and left City for dead with his pace. This is an unstoppable trait that made the goal and was almost as impressive as the finish.

You could see through the 90 minutes that Delap’s confidence was growing and growing with every touch, foul won, and counterattack. This is the kind of performance that could awaken him at Forest, allow him to play with this confidence every week.

Forest may have felt like £45m was expensive. But this is the potential level of Delap, and he could very quickly become one of the best in the league at this rate.

A huge performance, now he just needs to back it up with an equally strong showing.