Tehran

No major surprises in Queiroz list.  The Portuguese coach sticks to the old guns.

The eagerly awaited list of Team Melli players who would be traveling to Jordan for a training camp and then to Lebanon for the FIFA Word Cup match vs Lebanon, has been announced by Carlos Queiroz.

The 23-man squad was announced after the conclusion of the round 7 of the Persian Gulf League matches.. The Squad would be based in Amman for a week and the program includes  a friendly match in Amman with the host.
After the conclusion of the camp , Team Melli will be flying to Beirut to meet Lebanon in the third match of the Qualifying group of the World Cup 2012. This match will go a long way in defining the chances of Team Melli in this tightly contested group with includes South Korea , Uzbekistan , Qatar in addition to Iran and Lebanon.

Despite some expectations that Quieroz , after watching 7 rounds of the current league, will be calling some new players , this list is identical to the previous ones with only minor adjustments. The major addition is Spain based Osasuna player Masoud Shojaei, who is yet to be fully fit for his club and was not even on the bench during the last match Osasuna played against Barcelona in the La Liga. Shojaei has not played for Team Melli since the 2011 Asian Cup in which he suffered several injuries which required multiple several surgical operations.  Masoud Shojae started training a few weeks back to prepare himself for the league. He was selected by Quieroz for the Hungary camp but was met by objection of Osasuna club who were very reluctant to release him so early in his recovery.

While most of the legionnaires are included in the list , they are not expected to join the training camp due to the club commitments. These players will be joining the squad at the customary FIFA regulation of 3 days before an official match.

The 3 regular players missing are Khosrow Heydari , Mojtaba Jabbari , as well as the  suspended Andranik Teymourian.  Not surprisingly , Perspolis forward and last years top league striker Karim Ansarifard was dropped as a result of his poor form while his club is struggling at the end of the table.  The  21-year-old Ansarifard , ex-Saipa forward, has not featured in Perspolis starting line up recently.

Almost half of the selected players (10 out of 23 ) are from Esteghlal and Perspolis clubs, despite the two popular Tehran teams faring poorly in the league at the early stages. Perspolis is currently near the foot of the table , while Esteghlal is lingering at the lower mid table.