Furious Steven Gerrard has claimed his side lost to the referee as Al-Ettifaq lost their third match in four games.

The Saudi Pro League side lost out to Cristiano Ronaldo's Al-Nassr 1-0 in the King Cup of Champions this week, meaning they were knocked out of the competition.

Gerrard is under pressure at his new club, but he feels refereeing decisions are now going against his team.

Referee Piero Maza gave Nassr star Talisca his marching orders late into first-half stoppage time before a late challenge from Ettifaq's Ali Hazazi near the end of the 90 minutes saw Gerrard's side also down to 10-men.

Sadio Mane would then net the winner in extra time and after the match, Al-Ettifaq fumed in a statement to the Saudi FA over the red card VAR decision.

It read: "Ettifaq have submitted an official request to the Saudi Football Federation to disclose the recorded dialogue between the match officials and the VAR room that led to Ali Hazazi's sending off against Al Nassr in the King's Cup. The club management extends its sincere apologies to the fans for the undeserved exit from the 2023/24 King's Cup."

Gerrard has now given his take to the media. He said: "I thought it was a fantastic game, a typical cup game, with exciting end-to-end action. The referee had a big say on the outcome of the game.

"Congratulations to Al Nassr, a good team with good players and a good coach. We wish them luck moving forward, but we didn't lose to Al Nassr tonight, we lost to the referee unfortunately.

"I became a professional footballer in 1997 and I have never seen a decision as bad as that. The referee said to my staff that he sent my player off because of the reaction of Al Nassr players, so if that is the case, every time Al Nassr players react that referee is going to give a red card.

"I have watched thousands and thousands of games, I played in a thousand games, that in football is called a professional tactical foul. It wasn't dangerous, it wasn't malicious and it wasn't aggressive. That is not a red card, in any game of football, in any country, at any level it is a yellow card. Fact.

"We always take responsibility for the result but we went into today's game with injuries, without a striker. Dembele underwent surgery and will miss several weeks."