The Saudi club Al-Ittihad refused to be present inside the stadium of the match between Al-Ittihad Jeddah and Sepahan Isfahan, Iran, due to the presence of a statue inside the stadium.

The Al-Ittihad club players decided not to go to the field of the match stadium and to engage in training and exercises in the locker room before the start of the match because of the presence of a statue of “Qassem Soleimani”, the former head of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard, in front of the tunnel leading to the match field.

The representatives of the AFC decided to delay the start of the confrontation by 30 minutes until the current crisis was resolved, and the match was supposed to start at seven in the evening between the Saudi Al-Ittihad and the Iranian Sepahan Isfahan in the third group matches of the AFC Champions League.

The Saudi Federation is in the third group, alongside the Iraqi Air Force, the Iranian Siyahan Isfahan, and the Uzbek Olmalik