Mayeli Kohan is the most misunderstood man in Iranian football.

[Paradigm]

I am sorry, I know he has alot of enemies, but as a fan of Persepolis and someone who knows he was one of the most gheyrati and honest (yet hotheaded) players in the late 70's and 80s he does not deserve the treatment he gets.

He is a hezbollahi, yes. But he has always been one. Even before the revolution he was very conservative. He did not become one like so many we see today in order to move up. You may even say he's a bad coach, but he's no worse than any other coach in Iran. He is strict and talks harshly, but has anyone actually been able to show anything he has said is a lie? Talk to most players who played under him. The only ones who ever had issues with him are the same ones who seem to have attitude problems wherever they go (Daei, Azizi,...). They nearly beat his son to death in 97 after Iran's near f***up in WCQ, and then 50,000 swear at him and his family while he can't say anything. He does not deserve this. You think he is a punk? You do not know the strength of the mafia of some of the Iranian coaches we have like Ghalenoei, Kazemi, Misaghian... Even Parvin was like a godfather of types in Iranian football but he is at least a javanmard and he only swore at his players and staff, never at the fans, opponents....

When I saw this video and saw the part where Kohan said "Yani man bigheyrat shodam", I really felt for the man. These are not fake tears. I think he has finally been pushed past the breaking point and is suffering or has gone through a nervous breakdown. I don't wish this on someone who despite his negatives has also done alot of good for Iranian football, TM and Persepolis.

Saw the video clip; what a circus!! Without a doubt Mayeli-Kohan, Azizi, Daie, are the 3 biggest haashiehsaaz in the history of Iranian soccer!

[Paradigm]

yes, he failed in WC98 Q's.
but was he the only one?
the last one?
and given his results , was he THE WORST one? coz sure as hell we see others get far more shameful and disgraceful results than him, with players 100 times more exposed and int'l and pro than MK's.
the guy lost to qatar 2-0 IN qatar ... much like Ciro , 3-1 to bahrain.
at least he didnt lose to the lowly JORDAN IN AZADI !
did he?
or to ksa, again IN AZADI.

Dr Doom I agree with you 95% of the times, but in this case I must differ. Do you recall that U-23 team which won the AG in Busan 2002, and then was handed over to Mayeli-Kohan for 2004 Olympics? That was perhaps the best U-23 in the recent history of Iran football and MK managed to screw them up losing home and away to South Korea and China. He later took helm of both Peykan and Foolad in the IPL, and both teams were relegated to the 2nd division. His better two coaching positions were during the AC '96 and this recent IPL with Saipa after Littbarski had left. He seems to have more unsuccessful results than successful ones, and at any rate is a very incosistent coach. With him it's like playing Russian roulette, a random high stakes game.

[IranJavidan]

I'm sorry if this offends anyone, but Mayelikohan used to be a drunk in his younger years (I know that for a fact). Do not let his beard and radical views fool you otherwise.

He is as much of a bandwagon jumper than any other person in the system.

[Doctor DOOM]

afshin jan, Iran didnt lose to china at home.
they won 2-1

and as I always say, which olympic coach was successful that makes MK such an odd man out and a failure at olympics.

we brought foreigners from germany, italy, portugal, yugo, ... to advance by paying far more salary and a 1000 other bows and bendings and still they got as far ( some not even as far ) as MK.

now, if we were qualifying for olympics every time or even every other time and there comes MK and we fail with him, THEN we can hold this against him.
were we?
NO.

=============

peykan: he was in peykan for 2 months , midway through the season. why is HE the culprit and not the coach who selected the squad for peykan, played the first part of season , or the next coach under whom they got relegated at fault?
why only MK is picked?
is it not becoz he is the usual EASY TARGET ?

foolad lost all its influential players and the management cut their budget to a quarter of previous years, thus making them unable to retain their stars or buy new ones and they had to make do with most of their YOUTH team players as fill-ins for the likes of mobaali, kaabi, golmohamadi, badavi, kameli, mirzapoor, .... etc etc etc.
you think ANY club after this could stand up?

take khalatbari, salsali, castro, endoy, farhadi, ashjari and mosalman out of zob-ahan and replace them only with YOUTH team players.
you think they can do anything better than foolad ?
I guarantee they wont.


I'm not saying MK is Lippi.
far from it.
but we sometimes pick on the wrong things or unnecessarily accuse him of many things that are simply not fair.
why?
again ... becoz he is an EASY TARGET.
he is rishoo, hezbollahi, and a undiplomatic and simply too abrasive in his attitude and speech ( no matter how true and valid his points are )!

So if we ( meaning us, and the fans in iran, media or crowds, ... ) pick on him, he unlike many others, doesnt have supporters or gangs or "leaders" who would counter this and either answer much of this, or at least with their presence or words, make ppl think twice before accusing or abusing him.

in other words : EASY TARGET !

=================

we have ppl here who swear by a moron who lost to JORDAN ( not ksa, not korea, not japan ... but the third rate team of jordan !!!!!!!!!! ) IN AZADI , with truckload of EUROPEAN LEGIONNAIRES , ... and the likes of Macedonia's C team ....., who go at MK !!! LOL

or others who dont say a word when we lose to ksa IN AZADI, but suddenly find their tongue when talk comes to losing with a bunch of newcomers and amateurs ( as opposed to legionnaires and pros and ... ) AWAY from home to qatar !!!

to many of us losing in Azadi with your european LEGIONNAIRES and all, is the most shameful and pathetic stain a coach can have in Iran ... as compared to merely repeating the elimination from olympic qualifiers like MANY coaches BEFORE & AFTER him.

[Nokhodi]

I don't hold the Olympics failure against him as well. We have had more talented Olympic teams (the team that tried to qualify in 92 had Azizi, Golmohammadi, Shahroudi.... the 2000 team had Karimi, Mahdavikia, Yazdani....) and even they couldn't qualify. The failure of qualification for the Olympics lays solely on the stupidity and laziness of IFF and STB.

[Martin-Reza]

the guy lost to qatar 2-0 IN qatar ... much like Ciro , 3-1 to bahrain.
at least he didnt lose to the lowly JORDAN IN AZADI !
did he?
or to ksa, again IN AZADI.

In one single WCQ campaign with 8 games he lost and drew KSA, exactly like Daei, beside losing in Qatar and drawing twice with Kuwait. It was a very poor campaign, and you are trying to pick out the worst results of several different campaigns for comparison to make it look better.

He combined Daei's KSA results with Chiro's one major setup and added the inability to defeat Kuwait even once. He was lucky the results of the other teams in the group came in our favour, otherwise we wouldn't even have reached playoffs.

It is no co-incidence the guy is title-less and the big clubs have no interest in him. He started well as TM coach and then steadily declined until today.

[Doctor DOOM]

1- exactly which part of "IN AZADI" is ambiguous here?

2- "LUCK" is what YOU make of it.
when you trounce an opponent AWAY to china 4-2 and trounce them again, at home, 4-1 and trounce another, qatar, 3-1 at home, then you have set urself up for a "stroke of good luck" ( if ppl are so stingy to give due credit for good performances ).

in the same breath, you will NOT be lucky if you fail to beat the team that everyone else has beaten and when you lose at home to ur closest rival.

you still want to call it luck? so be it.



but I believe Daei also has been extremely lucky also ... namely "rahmati" factor .... which turned the games we shd have lost into draws and the game we shd have drawn into a win for us.

you want to call MK lucky? fine.
but at least be consistent and dont pick & choose where to use this "lucky" tag.

[Martin-Reza]

1) Wtf do I give about Azadi. In 2 games he got one point, same as Daei. Doesn't really make much of a difference where you get the point.

2) Who was talking about luck in our games? I just pointed out his WCQ campaign was not satisfying at all, and all of his later coaching jobs weren't really impressive either. What I meant was that he was lucky about other results, otherwise those setbacks would have cost us the playoff spot as well in 1997. I mean with 12 points out of 8 games, second place is not always secured.

[Doctor DOOM]

1- hehe... of course HERE, you wouldnt care about "losing in azadi". ( but in the same breath you make an issue of drawing w kuwait or ... !!!!! )
no surprises here

2- YOU.
YOU said MK got "lucky" with ....
not me

3-
12 pts out of (possible 24) 8 games = 1.5 pt's per game.
6 pts out of (possible 15) 5 games = 1.15 pt's per game.
so how come one coach is deemed "screw up and useless and garbage" but the other isnt ?
( I wont even bring up one coach getting second place, while the other got fourth ... coz that would be simply devastating to ur argument )

"consistency" is a good thing to have.
coz then, you wouldnt find ppl like me bringing up matters of "double standards" and "hypocrisy".

[Martin-Reza]

I didn't say MK was garbage because of that one campaign. The campaign was disappointing, but I think he is garbage due to his overall coaching career after 1996, not due to that one campaign. If we look at all the years MK was at Saipa and then Daei who was there one year and lead them from bottom of the table to the league title and then straigth into the next round of ACL, at a time when only the group leaders went there, this is a difference in quality. No doubt, pointwise MK's 8 games were more successful than Daei's 5.

But pointwise Branko's 2005 WCQ campaign (2.167 pts per game) was far more successful than Blazevic's 2001 WCQ campaign (1.875 pts per game). So is Branko a better coach than Blazevic, Mr. Consitency ?

[Doctor DOOM]

^ and whom are you comparing him with?
apart from a handful of vatani coaches, the likes of GN (whom you struggle to give credit to ) and Jalali , MK has done better than the rest.

--------------

again, if you want o bring in branko and the rest, then be FAIR and bring in the :
1- length of coaching
2- quality of players available ( european exports and ... )
3- the quality of league
4- the quality of games played
5- the quality and number and dynamics of the WCQ groups
6- .... etc etc etc

dont just zoom in on one issue which you feel ur pick has done better.
give me the WHOLE picture, including the above points

[zzgloo]

I like to define the word " HEZBULLAHI ", for some of our members whom may not have lived in Iran,in recent years............
It used to mean, a person who is the follower of " Hezbullah ", ( Party of God ),and refered to individuals who are more radical than typical followeres of the regim........
But, the name " Hezbullahi ",now a days, has a different meaning......and today's meaning, is some what non-religouse,and more social attitude of a class of people liveing in Iran.
........................................
Currant meaning : a person who has following qualities :
.......................................

1- Pretends he is religouse. ( BY, appearance,and talks )
2-Challanges other's devotion to the system.
3-Threatens others indirectly.
4-pretends haveing High connections.
5-Abuses others by his ( Limited Powers ).
.........................................

Mayeki-Kohan, is Desparate ,......As he is loseing his previliges, for over-spending his Hezullahi cards !

[Martin-Reza]

^ lol, so MK fills the definition almost perfectly.

again, if you want o bring in branko and the rest, then be FAIR and bring in the :
1- length of coaching
2- quality of players available ( european exports and ... )
3- the quality of league
4- the quality of games played
5- the quality and number and dynamics of the WCQ groups
6- .... etc etc etc

dont just zoom in on one issue which you feel ur pick has done better.
give me the WHOLE picture, including the above points

Well, 2-5 lead us from the world of KNOWLEDGE to the world of BELIEF. Not that a few numbers explain everything, but at least they are facts.

[Paradigm]

afshin jan, Iran didnt lose to china at home.
they won 2-1
and as I always say, which olympic coach was successful that makes MK such an odd man out and a failure at olympics.
we brought foreigners from germany, italy, portugal, yugo, ... to advance by paying far more salary and a 1000 other bows and bendings and still they got as far ( some not even as far ) as MK.

I think my main point was, MK had the best U-23 team ever in Iran's history (which had won the 2002 games with the likes of NKia, Mobali, Borhani, Nosrati, Kaabi, Rahmati, Alavi, Kazemian, Kameli, Badavi, Madanchi, Akbarpour, etc. who were all also TM players). MK should have done much better with that U-23, as I recall he lost to South Korea home and away, and away 3-1 to China. Now Branko twice in 2002 and 2004 led Iran to victory against SK, in the AG and AC semi and quarter finals.

This is a separate issue, I have no problems with Branko up to about Spring of 2005 when we defeated Japan in Azadi. He did a lot to bring some other players like Hash and Zandi into the squad and to further boost TM via supporting Nekounam as fixed player and discovering other domesatic players like Shojaie, Ando, and Jabbari. But something went wrong that last year with Branko and it was all downhill where problems in TM became vividly apparent and they continued until after GN took over in mid 2006.

P.S. The name is Farshid not Afshin.

[Doctor DOOM]

^ sorry farshid jan.

1- I agree his squad was a very good one.
and much like everyone else, I was disappointed by no qualifying. and I do hold him partially responsible. but if you all remember IFF suspended all omid games and camps for about 8 months and restarted the camp only 2 weeks left to the Olympic Q's !!!!
I clearly remember this delay when all our rivals were playing friendlies , we were sitting on our arses !!!


2- I agree, in the beginning branko did much for us, but by 2005 his attitude changed and it was like a totally NEW person in charge with all the wrong ideas and attitude! and the rest is history