Iran vs Iraq post match discussion

[Abtin]

Lucky Iranians in Australia..

[ehsan singapore]

gucci take his chances, but a striker has to be sneaky as well that the whole case. on the other hand we have two good forwards and we have dejagah,jahanbakash and shojayi,we have few other good players as well

[Abtin]

CQ post match comments in video: http://footballitarin.com/video_page.php?id=13104

[Bi-honar]

Well, you know me boys, I'm always looking for both critical and positive aspects of everything TM, but I must say that aside from the first 15-20 minutes that were understandably jittery, there was nothing but BRIGHT spots in this game. I don't even know where to begin!

First of all, I still can't believe we beat Iraq (the 2007 Champions and one of the top 8 teams in every Asian Cup since 1996) with our reserves! And it wasn't that we just beat them, but we either contained or dominated them in every aspect of the game, technically, tactically, speed wise and most importantly physical strength.

Since the revolution, there was very little separating us from Iraq, at most one goal to be exact (either way), with the exception of the 2006 LG Cup where we beat them 2-0. So for our reserve team to come in and show the self-belief, heart and desire to beat them in this manner, was a very pleasant surprise and it reminded me of the 70's where we were so far ahead of our opponents in Asia, that we could send our "B" team and still beat most teams.

I was VERY impressed with CQ taking a gamble with our younger players at this juncture and given our limited preparations. As I said in the game thread one of the fair criticisms of CQ has been that he's a little too conservative at times. This game showed that he's not afraid to experiment or take chances to the highest extent possible and that he had enough belief in his players and the depth of our squad to take such a gamble. So, double kudos to him for that.

One of the hurdles facing TM in the WC was fatigue and the perception that we didn't have the bench to rotate some of the players. CQ was obviously aware of that going into this tournament and it was important to resolve that issue before the tournament started. I believe that was one of the main reasons he fielded the "B" team and he must have been very satisfied with what he saw - the other reason being that he perhaps didn't feel that Iraq was even in the same league as our "A" team! Both of these are very encouraging.

Pouladi was obviously the only player from the "A" squad, but he hadn't practiced with the team since the WC, so it was also important to gauge his performance. Speaking of which, we only had 2 starting players in this match with more than 20 caps (Karim and Pouladi). 7 of our starting 11 had less than 5 caps with 6 of them either being capped for the 1st time or playing only their 2nd game! That should put this performance into perspective for everyone. And did I mention our transition play was AMAZING!

I'm now very hopeful of our chances in the tournament, not that I wasn't before, but I'm more confidently hopeful!

[Kavian]

None of the new faces were really impressive. But lack of preparation was very obvious in the team. Now you can see how important it is to play friendlies even against second or third rated teams.

[Tehranto]

None of the new faces were really impressive. But lack of preparation was very obvious in the team. Now you can see how important it is to play friendlies even against second or third rated teams.

Soursh Rafei, Ramin Rahmian, and Morteza Pouraliganji were very good.

[O-ZoNe]

Soursh Rafei, Ramin Rahmian, and Morteza Pouraliganji were very good.

I dunno about Rafiei...against a stronger opponent and more pressure I think he would be giving the ball up left and right. At times he wasn't convincing and as Martin Reza pointed out, if it was Shojaie we would be tearing him a new one right now. He did get better as the match wore on and perhaps more international experience will help round his game.

[Camran khan]

^I have to agree, I thought that Morteza Pouraliganji was good, so was Rezaeian (from the little I saw from him, I didn't notice him that much, was pretty tired while watching the game), Omid Ebrahimi was also pretty good except for a few bad passes, Ghafouri didn't impress me as much as he did vs South Korea, neither did Rafiei, I don't know if I missed something, but I didn't find him very impressive this game..

[Kiarash]

Iran vs Iraq post match discussion

I want Azmoun to start. I feel like this can be his tournament. It's a waste to bench him.

[Abtin]

Basically our A squad was on the bench, imagine what they would have done to Iraq

[Siavash]

Thing I really disliked was the obvious fact that in the first half TM was rushing, rushing and rushing the game none stop. This happens again and again and seems no one can correct it. The rushing was so bad that CQ had to get up and by show of his hand tried to calm the players down. We could blame that on youth and inexperience but this rushing scenario and forced passes that go nowhere must stop and be replaced by controlling of the game, accuracy and coolness.

[PSGman#19]

Thing I really disliked was the obvious fact that in the first half TM was rushing, rushing and rushing the game none stop. This happens again and again and seems no one can correct it. The rushing was so bad that CQ had to get up and by show of his hand tried to calm the players down. We could blame that on youth and inexperience but this rushing scenario and forced passes that go nowhere must stop and be replaced by controlling of the game, accuracy and coolness.

That's a shortcoming TM have since years. I don't know how it can be resolved.

In official match, it is always risky to throw so much new faces. it should always have to be a mixture of experienced and new players to be efficient.

[Dejagah#21]

One thing was extremely obvious today, TM desperately lacked proper preparations (friendly games) and that WILL be our downfall in this cup.. really depressing example of what our country has downgraded to

[IPG]

Azmoun can be described as world class and whatever as much as you want but he's not as good as Reza, this is fairly obvious. It's vital that we finally have something to bring off the bench though as that option would have been Karim at the WC

On Club level he has shown more potential though. He has gotten a lot of minutes at a level which is much higher than Charlton. The kid has a lot of potential.

[PSGman#19]

I see Gucci starting in the beginning of the tournament. If he doesnt perform very quickly, CQ will install Azmun in the starting XI in no time.