By: Attilla Mosony

International sanctions and lack of support from its own federation have threatened to derail Iran’s Asian Cup campaign. But the team says those setbacks have provided extra motivation to win.

As the top-ranked Asian Cup side, Iran carries the weight of expectations of a football mad nation of 85 million. But numerous issues have hindered the team’s lead up in the past six months.

So much so that coach Carlos Queiroz has declared his side the least prepared nation at the tournament. He says international sanctions and a lack of financial support from its own federation have threatened to derail the country’s Asian Cup campaign.

“Unfortunately we come to a situation that’s even worse than the World Cup, the international sanctions against Iran, we are struggling in all other actions and plans”

FIFA is still withholding almost $10 million in World Cup appearance money as a result of the sanctions, which led to the cancellation of training camps and pre-tournament games.

Since the World Cup in Brazil, the Iranians have only played one friendly match, against South Korea, before arriving in Australia. But despite the less than ideal preparations they are still considered one of the favourites. Striker Reza Ghoochannejhad insists his side can handle the pressure.

“Everybody is excited to play against Iran, and everybody is motivated, especially because we are coming from the World Cup, but this is the situation right now we can’t complain, we can’t make excuses,” he told SBS.

And for the large community of Iranian expats living in Australia the Asian Cup is a fantastic opportunity to watch their heroes live. On Sunday night 17,000 passionate fans turned up in Melbourne to create a little slice of Tehran.

The 2-nil victory over Bahrain was a huge relief for the team and fans following a troublesome build-up to the tournament. Queiroz says his side is determined to get on with the job by using its recent setbacks as motivation.

“We come here with our soul, with our art with our spirit, as we did before the World Cup, with our training session, using those problems and issues as sources of our inspiration

Iran face Qatar in its second group C match in Sydney on Thursday night.