How come?

[Martin-Reza]

It's a bit strange, our youth teams regulary fail to impress, they even lose against Asian minors and are far away from being among the top Asian nations. Yet, the U23 can compete with the big guys and TM surely is among Asia's topsides!

On the other hand I always wonder about Austria. The Austrian youth teams, up to the U19 regulary impress, even against European topsides, but when the players grow up, they are not able to really compete on top level.

Any ideas to explain this phenomenon?

[pajamNL]

good question, Holland has the same problem, as we, Iran

i really don't know the reason for it, is it a part of culture and habits in ours at young age?

[IRN Rugby Playa]

in holland the youth are too busy at the red light district of amsterdam (u know wut i mean).......only when they grow up , htey understand they need to get ino sports hahahahaha..

[mkbf2]

I blame a horribly structured system with lack of training and money. Look at the US youth system... although there NT may not be so great, they have an amazing youth system where they pool thousands of players and pick like the top 200 for training from the age of say 13 or 14. They train there players, relying less on individual skill which i believe is the opposite for iran

[maij]

In the early seventies , Iran youth football system was incredibly succesfull. In fact Iran won 5 consecutive Asian Youth championship ( including being co-winners) and produce countless number of quality players that eventually made it at big time in Team Melli.

After the revloution , this youth system dissapeared and since that succes 30 odd years ago , Iran never won anything at youth level....Reason......I am truley confused !

The best youth team was only a few years back during the Athens olympic qualifiers , but even that star-studded team did not acheive anything !!!!!!

I love to hear some theories .....

[Ali Chicago]

It's a bit strange, our youth teams regulary fail to impress, they even lose against Asian minors and are far away from being among the top Asian nations. Yet, the U23 can compete with the big guys and TM surely is among Asia's topsides!
On the other hand I always wonder about Austria. The Austrian youth teams, up to the U19 regulary impress, even against European topsides, but when the players grow up, they are not able to really compete on top level.
Any ideas to explain this phenomenon?

One explanation could be the poor level of Austrian league where player can't develop from u19 and afterward. This is the major problem in US soccer as well. US is decent at the youth but MLS in US can't continue their development at the very high level pace.


As for Iranian case, I think it is a combination of problems. Coaching, lack of proper league at the youth level and weakness of soccer clubs to have youth programs, Iranian physics Vs rest of Asians. In Iran only Foolad, Sepahan and Zobahan have farily organized youth programs and lot of foolad players are the result of that prorgram, Kaabi, Mobali, Hojjat Chaharmahali, Navid Kia is a product of Sephahan youth program. In other countries even Janpan and Korea I am sure each decent club has proper youth teams, so their youngester are ready to compete at a higher level.

Another issue is coaching and planning that our youth programs don't have proper coaches and planning. The current u19 team that lost to China twice, didn't have teh current coach Oliviera until 2 months ago. For a while Ghasempoor and Majid NamjooMotagh ran the team and they didn't get paid, so Ghasempoor quit and went to UAE to coach a second division team and NamjooMotlagh ran the team on his own for one month but still no money, so he eventually quit and coached Shahrdari BandaAbbas. While I am sure China had a much more long term plan.
Another issue is physic. Until 19 we don't have a huge phsysical size advantage over East Asians. However after than somehow we gain that adavnatage. Look at the size, weight, height advantage our TM has over East Asians. when it comes to after 19 I think our physics (Genetics, we are taller stronger, etc.) becomes more pronounced comapred to East Asaians. This is one area Iran has strenght over Japan or Korea.

So in summary it is organization, money, strucuture that we are miles behind at the youth level. We make up for that at the adult level with the sheer size of players that we have much more than them, our sheer size of youth (Iran is the youngest country in the world I think) and larger number o youth that play soccer, plyus better level of adult soccer level.

[zereshk-ali]

I blame a horribly structured system with lack of training and money. Look at the US youth system... although there NT may not be so great, they have an amazing youth system where they pool thousands of players and pick like the top 200 for training from the age of say 13 or 14. They train there players, relying less on individual skill which i believe is the opposite for iran

good post.

we need a revolution in our football similar to the one that Carlos Queiroz brought to Portuguese football in the mid-80's in developing a similar youth system that translates up from the youngest team to the national team level.

the effects on the Portuguese system was staggering, producing the golden generation that won the youth wc in 87 and 89 and formed the basis for their current success.

on the youth front too they have not looked back since, recovering from obscurity to become, along with France, one of the regular producers of top youth talent in European football.

from reading some of Simoes interviews it seems he is putting in a similar system but it seems to me that everyone else has slowly caught on and are copying the Portuguese blue print.

as for producing very little talent before a certain age, I have to say that I prefer it this way round compared to a country like Colombia that produces amazing talent and results regularly at u20 level and below but then fade.

[mkbf2]

thats amazing....

see, the way to deal with a youth system is like the portugese. Structure and planning.

Yet, all of this, (we all know this is a big step) is getting support from IFF and the govt, without them, nothing can be done. my theory is that nothing will ever be done even if a great proposal to overhaul the youth system was introduced to them.

[perspolees]

It's a bit strange, our youth teams regulary fail to impress, they even lose against Asian minors and are far away from being among the top Asian nations. Yet, the U23 can compete with the big guys and TM surely is among Asia's topsides!
On the other hand I always wonder about Austria. The Austrian youth teams, up to the U19 regulary impress, even against European topsides, but when the players grow up, they are not able to really compete on top level.
Any ideas to explain this phenomenon?

the answer is always multifactorial, never seek one answer...
1. under21 teams can impress but their tm does not this is a phenomenon with many of the topsides..so there is no cause and effect relaationship.
2. For Iran the reason is lack of infrastructure for sure
3. You adapt to the sick invironment that you practice in..by that i mean the standards of a system dictates what you will be..for example iranian doctors that become board certified in the US and actually go back to practice there after some time are no different from the iranian graduates because thats what they do on a daily basis! or for instance the engineers learn that the tools and rules of success and getting somewhere are way differnet than the ones that they were exposed in a different environment...so our youth are clean and young and with good direction they have shown to do wonders but after a while they are the same lazy unprofessional players that iranian football has...Sad but true..

look at Kaabi, Karimi, etc..these guys officially say it out loud that they just want to earn easy money and do not care about the more important stuff that comes with education, infrastructure and solid beliefs..

[Haf3z]

It reminds me a little of Sweden. The youth teams here are mostly based on players within Sweden, but still they manage to do good results against stronger European oppositions. And the Swedish league isn't even good, that's the funny part.

[Hajagha]

It's a bit strange, our youth teams regulary fail to impress, they even lose against Asian minors and are far away from being among the top Asian nations. Yet, the U23 can compete with the big guys and TM surely is among Asia's topsides!
On the other hand I always wonder about Austria. The Austrian youth teams, up to the U19 regulary impress, even against European topsides, but when the players grow up, they are not able to really compete on top level.
Any ideas to explain this phenomenon?

- Ban Austrian girls from the stadium.
- Ban child molestation in Iran. Specaially ban Human for coaching under 18.

Both improve significantly.

[pajamNL]

it can't be all about structure and youth systems, again is use Holland as a example, who has very good youth systems and a strong National team, but their youth team fails to impress