Nottingham Forest boss Steve Cooper felt they deserved a late penalty in their FA Cup defeat to Liverpool.

The Reds set up a Wembley semi-final date with Manchester City after Diogo Jota's 78th-minute goal earned a narrow 1-0 quarter-final win at Championship side Forest on Sunday.

Philip Zinckernagel struck a glorious chance wide for Forest just moments earlier while the home side had a claim for a penalty when Ryan Yates went to ground when trying to go around Alisson Becker. Referee Craig Pawson waved away the protests with his decision backed up by VAR Andy Madley.

But Cooper said: “Yatesy is one of the most honest of players, too honest, so the feeling was there was no way he would go down – plus could he go on and score?

“But I haven't seen them back. If they were down the other end in front of their supporters it would have been really interesting.

“Yatesy is as honest as they come. It was just one of those things, I'm not going to talk about VAR, or what could have been in the game. On the whole I thought we handled them pretty well and couldn't make the most of the moments we created."

Liverpool's winner was confirmed after a VAR check ruled Jota had stayed onside before turning in a Kostas Tsimikas cross from the left.

And Cooper said: “I haven't seen them back but I think they would have been interesting had they been at the other end.

“I got that feeling from the Liverpool officials, but it's the first time we've experienced it (VAR) here and you have to trust the process of what it is. I think it was tight with the goal because they had VAR look at the offside."