Ex Team Melli player and current Tractorsazi Tabriz player , expressed his interest in playing in what would be his second World Cup after his initial appearance in World Cup 2006. Ali Karimi , who was injured and off football for a few weeks, is still considered an influential player in his club, but was ignored by Carlos Queiroz after he decided to quit football altogether at the end of last season.

Karimi’s decision to quit football was as the result of losing the Hazfi Cup Final to Sepahan at the end of last season, however he soon changed his mind but neither his club Perspolis nor Team Melli showed any interest in his services. Karimi eventually turned up at Tractorsazi and showed glimpses of his brilliances and wizardry, although not consistently. The Tabriz team temporarily claimed top spot in the Persian League  table before Karami’s previous club Perspolis replaced them at the top.

 Asked by a reporter of his aspiration with team Melli in Brazil, Karimi responded “If there is a chance , God willing , I like to serve my country and play in the World Cup. Players’ selection should be based on  skills, abilities and standards, their current forms , the number of appearances with their clubs and their track record. These are the standards that the national teams across the world are using for their selection. If that criterion is applied here, then I think I stand a chance and hope through my display and effort with my club, I make the squad. However , if there are other things behind the scenes  that I am not aware of or hidden from the public,  then I am not interested.”

Karimi continued his sarcastic tone when he said “I wish success for Team Melli but I sincerely hope that our players do not fight amongst themselves at the end of the match against Argentina trying for Messi’s shirt”

With such a statement, it is highly unlikely that the 35 year old midfielder will endear himself to the Team Melli selectors and find a place in next year’s World Cup squad.

Foolad Sepahan coach Zlatko Kranjcar has threatened that he will stop his players from joining Team Melli camp a result of Queiroz ignoring the club’s request for a coordination meeting.
The root of the problem lies in the insistence e of Queiroz to have full control on players, requiring the selected Team Melli players to be fully available and committed for the camps or friendly matches while clubs such as Sepahan will be involved in Asian Champions League next year.

The Croat coach , Zlatko Kranjcar said that “Sepahan has accumulated 200 points on its own and that was the deciding factor in AFC awarding 4 places for Iran in the next Asian Champions league to Iran. This competition is very important for us and is a good source of revenue. We have asked FFIRI several times for a coordination meeting with Team Melli technical staff to sort out a program , but they have ignored our requests.”

Queiroz announced in his Sunday meeting that ” if Iran wants success in the World Cup , all the decisions regarding the players must be taken by him (Queiroz)”. That statement infuriated the coaches of the 4 Iranian clubs taking part in this current Asian Champions league as the clubs will be deprived on their best players and hence their chances of qualifying will be seriously threatened. Krancjar has also taken an exception on Queiroz statements which the Croat thinks of as undermining the role of the clubs coaches on their players.

Krancjar added “All the World Cup teams have players who would be playing the Champions League. I don’t see anyone of them holding their players because they will be playing in the World Cup. Anyway, playing in such a high level competition will only lead to improve their readiness and competitive edge for Team Melli.”

The tension between Queiroz and Kranjcar has been on the rise lately.

During the press conference which Querioz held to announce the Road Map to Brazil 2014 , the Team Melli coach announced his interest in the Japanese/Iranian player  Aria Jasuru Hasegawa.

The 25 years player ( born 29 October 1988) Japanese born  football player , is the son of an Iranian father and a Japanese mother who currently plays for FC Tokyo. Jasuru Hasegawa has in fact been selected for Japan National team several times but never played for the Japan which makes him eligible to play for Iran if he is awarded the Iranian nationality based on his father’s  citizenship.

The FC Tokyo player Jasuru Hasegawa’s situation is very much like the American/Iranian Beitashour , both born outside Iran and both selected for their country of birth national teams , but never made their debuts.

With the interest in Aria Jasuru Hasegawa now in the open, Queiroz once again sends an explicit message that he puts much effort in selecting players based outside of Iran rather than looking domestically for home born players.

Carlos Queiroz with his usual non-revealing diplomatic statements did not give away much , preferring to use diplomacy. “It is an honor . It is just for us to enjoy now. We will be playing against the best in the world and that is a great opportunity for us to progress and be a better team” The Portuguese coach said,

While Queiroz statement was measured and cautious, his counterpart coach in the group, Safet Sucic’s statement , was cheeky. Bosnia-Herzegovina’s coach had the audacity to cal Iran, only weak team group, while Iran has flogged and comprehensively defeated his Bosnian team with all their star including Dzeko , 3-2 in Bosnia.  “We can’t be unhappy despite the fact that we are in a group with Argentina, one of the title favorites. Of the other teams, only Iran is weaker” The Bosnian coach said.

[quote] Of the other teams, only Iran is weaker[/quote] Safet Sucic, coach of Bosnia-Herzegovina

Daniel Amokachi , The coach of Nigeria said “Argentina are world power , but we cannot afford to underestimate Iran or Bosnia”

While Argentina coach , clearly feeling relieved that he was not given the group of death . Alejandro Sabella , said “We did not go into the group of death, there are other groups which are more complicated and more difficult” . The Argentine coach refused to comment on the other teams of the group.

The local comments in Iran was also a mixture of comments depending on the involvement of the people quoted.

One of the former Team Melli coaches, Mansour Pourhaidary who is currently is the technical director of Esteghlal, does not believe that Team Melli will qualify to the next round. “We have to  seize fooling the fans into believing that Team Melli will qualify against much better teams who have  prepared themselves much better , particularly playing Friendly games and have a superior training schemes than ours.”

Karim Bagheri , the former Captain of Team Melli was not very optimistic about Iran chances of qualifying considering the preparations of the team so far and lack of Practice friendly matches. Bagheri however said that “our players should not only concentrate on playing against Messi and facing Argentina, as the two other teams of the group  are quite powerful and have ambitions of qualifying in their own right.”

From the current squad, Ando Teymourian sounded quite confident although not too complacent. Teymourian who was one of the pivotal players in Iran’s qualification said ‘We do not intend to go to Brazil as tourists.   We have to demonstrate  our grit and resolve in the world cup.” For Teymourian , it will be his second participation in the world Cup after the 2006 edition. He was thankful for the draw and said that was much better than other Asian teams especially Australia. “I could not have imagined my condition if we were drawn in the same group as the World Champions  Spain  and runners up  the Netherlands they way Australia has been drawn”

If the record books is anything to go by , Team Melli should not be fearing the opposition in Group F of the FIFA World Cup Brazil 2014, The draw that was held earlier this evening has placed Iran in the same group with Argentina, Bosnia and Nigeria,

Going through the records of matches between Iran and the three teams, interesting and ironic facts emerge. Team Melli has the distinction of being the first team to meet Bosnia national team in 1993 after the country’s independence from Former Yugoslavia. FIFA however, refused to recognize that match as Bosnia was not a FIFA member at the time.

Iran and Bosnia- Herzegovina had cordial and friendly relations at all levels throughout the years . In all the two countries have played 5 times with Iran winning 4 and drawing one. The first match is not included in this data because it wasn’t considered an official recognized match.  The best overall results of Team Melli against a European team are against Bosnia with two significant results of 5-2 and a 4-0 wins.

With Bosnia rapid progress in the European football including producing World Class players such as Hasan Salihamidžić and Edin Džeko,, the Eastern European team has not managed to defeat Iran in any game. The last match in Sarajevo ended in a 2-3 win for Team Melli with the goals scored by  Masoud SHOJAEI (79), Arash BORHANI (86) and Andranik TEYMOURIAN (93). Bosnia scored by perhaps their greatest ever forward,   Edin Džeko (52)(65) who currently plays for Manchester City.

The other interesting fact with Bosnia is that both teams had a coach which took them on the brink of the World Cup. Miroslav ‘Ciro’ Blažević, the charismatic Croatian coach , lead Team Melli to the 2002 play-off against the Republic of Ireland and lost the two legged series with the smallest of margins.

8 years later  Blažević, found himself in the same situation with Bosnia when he led them to a play off match against Portugal for the World Cup 2010. Bosnia and  Blažević, again lost the series in a narrow 1-0 margin. In that year Edin Džeko scored 9 goals in the qualifying rounds.

Team Melli played a lone match against Nigeria and Argentina. The match against Nigeria in Hong Kong was in the Carlsberg Cup. The 4 side tournament was in preparation for Iran’s participation in the FIFA World Cup 1998. Iran already played against the powerful Uruguay team earlier on and was leading by an Ali Smaereh goal until Golmohammady scored an own goal 7 minutes before time to make it 1-1. The penalty shootout went Uruguay’s way and Iran had to play Nigeria in the 3^rd place match. Despite Team Melli playing a much better game against the Africans, they failed to capitalize on their many scoring chances while Nigeria pounced on one of their chances to score the only game of the match and the winner.

.The match that really stands out amongst this series is the only one played against Argentina is the Santiago Bernabu stadium , the home of Real Madrid. In 1977 Iran was invited for this 65^th anniversary celebration to paly in a 4 side tournament that also included  Argentina and Algeria national teams . The first match was against the Argentinians , the host of next year’s World Cup. The team that Iran faced was the core of the Argentina team that won the world cup a year later including the likes of  TARANTINI
OLGUIN ,  ARDILES , VILLA  , HOUSEMAN , LUQUE and BERTONI .

Argentina lead through a Daniel Bertoni penalty but Team Melli played one of its best matches on record leading Argentina to defend desperately against onslaughts of offensive moves lead by the brilliant Hassan Rowshan and Adelkhani. Team Melli eventually got its reward when Mohammad Sadeghi scored with 11 minutes to go. Both Hassan Nazari and Rowshan came close to scoring a winner for Iran , but the match ended in a draw for Iran to record a famous result and with it the attention  of World Football observers.

Many European journalist took notice and started looking at Iran football at a time when Aisa was the minnows of World football and its team were the punching box for the European and Latin American teams. With a draw against the powerful Argentines , the future World Cup winner, Team Melli endeared itself to many football fans and journalist in the world.

Interestingly enough , Iran played both Argentina and Nigeria in the last FIFA U-17 World Cup championship in the UAE last october. The match against Argentina finsihed 1-1 in the group stages , while the Nigerians , who went on to win the title were too hot for Iran at the Khalifa Bin Zayed Stadium in Al Ain racking up three goals in the first half en route to a 4-1 win in the Round of 16.

In 2014 , Iran will be playing these three teams with a proud record. Argentina has the best player in the world in its team and a number of World class players, but then again it was a similar situation  nearly 4 decades ago when Team Melli faced the future champion and came out with a proud result. There is no reason that Team Melli should not repeat that feat. The biggest obstacle will be the psychological hurdle.

THE RESULTS