Omid team's moral boosting win
Iran's Olympics team earns a valuable away victory against arch rival Iraq and made their qualification challenge a serious one. This victory comes at the back of series of events that helped its fruition.
When it comes to rivalries in Asia, an Iran-Iraq tie is as mouth-watering as a japan-South Korea one with the two Middle Eastern nations having a long tradition of fierce battles where victory means far more than the 3 points that a football match brings about. So any tie with the neighbor is choke-full of determination and drive that sets it apart from other games in a tournament. With each nation having won and lost some nail biting match ups, it seems the fate of both Iran and Iraq is bound on some unwritten law that each one’s glory ought to come at the expense of the other. The two nations have been consistently grouped in various Asian competitions, tournaments and qualifiers in the past few decades. Therefore, it came as no surprise to see yet another tie for the Olympic honors, just before the final group stage.
The Omid team had to overcome some rather vicious inner demons first before stepping onto the pitch against Iraq, though. It has been a common thing to see a section of these Under-23 players be denied permission to exit the country for away games, which drastically affected their fortunes and we saw year after year, despite having the talent and ambition, Iran’s Olympic team fall prey to their own nonsensical policies. But that isn’t the worst inner demon they faced, as edition after edition, inspite of much talk and promises by the officials, usually the selection of the staff and the coaches is left with mere weeks left for crucial qualifiers, followed by lack of preparation and test games, thus, seeing an uncoordinated, inexperienced bunch of young players trying hard to do the impossible. So it should not come as a major surprise to see Iran fail to qualify for the Olympics in 36 years.
However, this year, despite the late selection of the staff, headed by the young, ambitious former Esteghlal star, Alireza Mansourian (of the triumph over Russia with Team Melli fame, post Ghotbi era) and assisted by Markar Aghajanian (Former Paas player and captain), with the help of the authorities the issue was exit of young military-eligible players was finally solved and Iran, after decades saw its full squad get the nod to travel to its away games. It must be mentioned that thanks to our football federation officials, the lads traveled on a chartered flight, which is another first for our Omid teams.
Much credit must be given to the team and its staff who had only a week or little more to gather their squad and only one test game against the Team Melli, on some patches showed good sense of football with some slick passing and triangulations that held the promise of better days for us. Yes, they did have some rather questionable moments in the game which can be attributed to their lack of preparation and crucial game jitters. But I believe they held theirs well and showed enough intelligence and talent to keep up our hopes of playing in Olympics after 9 tries. What impressed me was inspite of their age, they kept their heads during the final two quarters where tremendous pressure was applied by the home team and our lads, quite intelligently, ran down the clock with short passing and moves that is seen in much more experienced squads. Kudos must be given to the young coaching staff as well for handling the pressure well and using the right strategy and substituting tactics.
The goal was a great goal and underlined the maturity of some of our key players, especially Aliasgar, Ansarifard and the midfield dynamo, Mohsen Mosalman, who after tricking the keeper, slotted home the match winner. With the home game on Thursday and our lads back home playing in front of our own fans, my money is on Mansourian’s boys to make Iran proud and reach the final stage of the qualifiers after seeing their arch rival off in this tie.
http://directkicks.blogspot.com/2011...sting-win.html
Iran's Olympics team earns a valuable away victory against arch rival Iraq and made their qualification challenge a serious one. This victory comes at the back of series of events that helped its fruition.
When it comes to rivalries in Asia, an Iran-Iraq tie is as mouth-watering as a japan-South Korea one with the two Middle Eastern nations having a long tradition of fierce battles where victory means far more than the 3 points that a football match brings about. So any tie with the neighbor is choke-full of determination and drive that sets it apart from other games in a tournament. With each nation having won and lost some nail biting match ups, it seems the fate of both Iran and Iraq is bound on some unwritten law that each one’s glory ought to come at the expense of the other. The two nations have been consistently grouped in various Asian competitions, tournaments and qualifiers in the past few decades. Therefore, it came as no surprise to see yet another tie for the Olympic honors, just before the final group stage.
The Omid team had to overcome some rather vicious inner demons first before stepping onto the pitch against Iraq, though. It has been a common thing to see a section of these Under-23 players be denied permission to exit the country for away games, which drastically affected their fortunes and we saw year after year, despite having the talent and ambition, Iran’s Olympic team fall prey to their own nonsensical policies. But that isn’t the worst inner demon they faced, as edition after edition, inspite of much talk and promises by the officials, usually the selection of the staff and the coaches is left with mere weeks left for crucial qualifiers, followed by lack of preparation and test games, thus, seeing an uncoordinated, inexperienced bunch of young players trying hard to do the impossible. So it should not come as a major surprise to see Iran fail to qualify for the Olympics in 36 years.
However, this year, despite the late selection of the staff, headed by the young, ambitious former Esteghlal star, Alireza Mansourian (of the triumph over Russia with Team Melli fame, post Ghotbi era) and assisted by Markar Aghajanian (Former Paas player and captain), with the help of the authorities the issue was exit of young military-eligible players was finally solved and Iran, after decades saw its full squad get the nod to travel to its away games. It must be mentioned that thanks to our football federation officials, the lads traveled on a chartered flight, which is another first for our Omid teams.
Much credit must be given to the team and its staff who had only a week or little more to gather their squad and only one test game against the Team Melli, on some patches showed good sense of football with some slick passing and triangulations that held the promise of better days for us. Yes, they did have some rather questionable moments in the game which can be attributed to their lack of preparation and crucial game jitters. But I believe they held theirs well and showed enough intelligence and talent to keep up our hopes of playing in Olympics after 9 tries. What impressed me was inspite of their age, they kept their heads during the final two quarters where tremendous pressure was applied by the home team and our lads, quite intelligently, ran down the clock with short passing and moves that is seen in much more experienced squads. Kudos must be given to the young coaching staff as well for handling the pressure well and using the right strategy and substituting tactics.
The goal was a great goal and underlined the maturity of some of our key players, especially Aliasgar, Ansarifard and the midfield dynamo, Mohsen Mosalman, who after tricking the keeper, slotted home the match winner. With the home game on Thursday and our lads back home playing in front of our own fans, my money is on Mansourian’s boys to make Iran proud and reach the final stage of the qualifiers after seeing their arch rival off in this tie.
http://directkicks.blogspot.com/2011...sting-win.html
Otherwise I am more confused than before! 
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