Carlos Queiroz , Team Melli  coach with “humility” urged the football federation and the authorities to find a solution for the missing key players in the squad.

On arrival in Johannesburg , Queiroz gave a brief statement to the press , pleading with his superiors to actively seek the release of players such as Mehrdad Pooladi , Soroush Rafei , Hossein Mahini , Mohammad Nouri and others who are either totally banned from playing football or have restriction on their playing  rendering them not being able to be in the squad. The restrictions are normally in the form of players not being allowed to leave the country under military service regulations.

Queiroz said “ In order to achieve our objectives , I need players. I’m respectfully  appealing to  the authorities to realize the importance of the presence of some key players that we require and work to solve their problems.”.

He said officials of the Football Association and coaches of Team Melli  meantime, spent a lot of energy and worked hard. “Despite months without being pay,  we’ve worked hard to achieve the team goals. With respect to the authorities, we humbly believe that there are ways we want to help the team, it would be no cost!”

Responding to the question whether any friendly games in the South African camp has been arranged, Queiroz said “as long as we have players missing , I do not have anything to say about this topic.”

Team Melli is setting up a 10 days camp in Johannesburg in preparation for the AFC Asian Cup 2015 in Australia. No friendly matches have been confirmed yet in this camp.