Farah fumes as Lebanon eliminated in controversial loss

Lebanon have been sent packing from the World Cup after having three tries disallowed against Tonga, one of which left Robbie Farah fuming.

The Cedars came agonisingly close to pulling off the upset of the tournament on Saturday, going down 24-22 against their highly-fancied opponents in a thrilling quarter-final.

Lebanon thought they had tied the game at 22-22 early in the first half when Adam Doueihi cut through to put the ball down after a well-worked Cedars back-line move.

However the decision was sent to the video referee, who overturned the live decision of try to disallow it for obstruction.

One of the Lebanese forwards had stopped in the Tongan defensive line after being used as a decoy, and despite not appearing to make any contact with a Tongan player, was ruled to have impeded.

Lebanon captain Farah was absolutely gobsmacked by the call and sprinted over to referee Gerard Sutton for an explanation.

"He hasn't impeded anybody!" Farah pleaded.

To make matters worse for the Cedars, Tonga marched down the field on the very next set of six and landed a penalty goal that proved to be the winning margin.

Man of the match Mitchell Moses said he was heartbroken to be leaving the World Cup in such controversial fashion.

"We had those calls not go our way the whole tournament," he said after full-time.

"To be pulled up by some calls that weren't right is hard considering how hard the boys worked."

It is the first time in World Cup history that Tonga have reached the semi-finals.

In an end-to-end affair in which both sides threw the ball around, Tonga's power up front eventually took them over the line.

While Mate Ma'a dominated the opening stages to pile on three tries in 22 minutes, a valiant Cedars side wouldn't give up.

They remained within one try for much of the match - including an extended scoreless period in the second half - and made things interesting late on with a try-of-the-tournament contender from Abbas Miski.

But they couldn't clinch a late winner, with Tonga progressing to a semi-final next weekend in Auckland against England or Papua New Guinea.

with AAP