Croatian football coach Dragan Skocic (51) has been named Iran’s new coach, the football association announced there.
Rijeka’s Dragan Skocic has replaced Belgian Marco Wilmots on the bench of Iran following two consecutive defeats in qualifying for the FIFA 2022 World Cup against Bahrain (0-1) and Iraq (1-2).
According to the Iranian state news agency IRNA, Skocic has agreed to sign with the Iranian Football Federation until the end of the second round of the FIFA 2022 World Cup qualifications, or by June this year.
Another Croat on Iran bench
Skocic followed in the footsteps of Tomislav Ivic , Stanko Poklepovic , Miroslav Blazevic and Branko Ivankovic , all of whom managed the Iranian football team quite successfully.
“It is certainly an honor to be in the company of other great Croatian coaches. Croats are highly respected in Iran, so I’m really happy that I got the opportunity to be the coach of Iran, a great football nation,” says Skočić in an interview with HRT’s Ivan Dorian Molnar .
Skočić has been working in Iran since 2013 and has led four clubs, Malavan, Foolad, Knooneh be Knooneh and Sanat Naft.
“With three of the four teams I led, I made the greatest successes in their history. I think this was one logical sequence. I came up with something very tangible, and that is the position of the Iranian national team coach,” he added, noting that this is actually his biggest career challenge.
Iran “hunts” Bahrain and Iraq
Iran is currently ranked third in Group C of the second qualifying round with six points from four appearances.
Iraq tops with 11 points from five duels, the second is Bahrain with nine points from five appearances as well, with Hong Kong with five points and Cambodia with one point, and both teams also played five matches each.
The winners of all eight groups and the four best runner-up teams will compete in the third qualifying round.
“There will be a battle, the key matches are with Bahrain and Iraq. Both games are played in Tehran in front of a full stadium that seats 100,000 people. We have a lot of looks, I hope we pass the group. The key matches will be against my friend Srecko Katanec (current Iraq coach.). It will be interesting,” Skocic adds, pointing out that expectations are high, that everyone wants Iran to qualify for the FIFA World Cup 2022, and especially after a great performance at the last edition in Russia, where they almost passed the group with Spain, Portugal, and Morocco.
Skocic’s assistants will be Mladen Zganjer, former U-21 national team coach and Toni Usnik, who worked at the Slovenian national team headquarters.
