POST-MATCH DISCUSSION | vs. UAE - Asian Cup 2015

[mayhem]

What you have to see in these kind of matches and our WCQ in general, is that we HAVE NO PLAN B.
It only takes opponents to score a goal on us (god forbid), and only then we will see TM show big weaknesses and wholes in their game. Players will start panicking like vs Bosnia, and this, will be a very serious issue/possibility once we face much better finishers like Japan, Korea, Australia.

Can we really come back from conceding a goal? Are we capable? Queiroz's tactics only show a plan A and no plan B. Personally I just pray that our defense stays impenetrable until the final because this team does not know how to take control of matches even when we absolutely need the win and it's do or die (Bosnia/UAE)

Anyways we need go full force and focused vs Iraq to get the job done, because then from the semis anything can happen.

I think we are playing with Plan B all the time. Plan A would be controlling midfield by moving balls around fast and playing through middle.

Plan B are usually long balls upfront and wish for the best.

I don't like the style but I can't complain if it gets results.

[khodam]

I thought UAE put up a good fight. They did not grass roll and their #10 Omar A. is top class player. He really reminded me of AK8. Great ball handling and impressive vision and delivery. Neku and Ando did their job to stop him and that dampened any real threat on our goal. It would be a pity if Omar A. s not picked up by some European team.

On the Iran side, I do not understand the idea of playing long balls to the lonely striker. At times it feels like Reza or Azmon are so lonely up there. I keep thinking (hoping), CQ has a different game plan somewhere for the top teams.

[Tehranto]

Probably my two favourite TM players of all time - the other being Mahdavikia - interview at the end of the match.

[HuSsAiN]

How comes Ando needs a translator? Did he forget his English?

[Bi-honar]

But isn't this what Ghotbi did and yes we did win the group, but lost to Korea and got kicked out even before we got warmed up!!! CQ is CQ for a reason people!! He just didn't happen to be chosed by Alex Ferguson for his good looks, the guy knows his shit( cant say the same about our people here in the forum , including me!) I rather play ugly football and win as opposed to play gorgeous look pretty and lose! Also remember that CQs hands are tied whenever it comes to preparation, we had 2 friendlies, as opposed to 12-14 for our rivals, we are doing the absolute bare minimum but getting the most results. I say CQ is a genius, wouldn't you!!??

Eerooni joon, the issue isn't playing defensive or CQ knowing his shit. I'm pretty sure everyone agrees that TM is solid defensively and hats off to CQ for that. The issue is that playing defensively is putting too much pressure on our defense and in a tournament setting they will gradually become more and more fatigued and completely buckle at some point.

We saw that in the game against Bosnia in the WC and we were starting to see that again last night. UAE simply didn't have the quality to punish us, but stronger teams do (Bosnia only had 3 more shots on us than UAE and they scored 3 goals!). If you look at it the other way, the fact that we do have a solid defense is the exact reason that we should be focusing more on and working on our offense - to take even more pressure off defense.

We can't play every game as if we're still playing Argentina, because we all remember what happened after the Argentina game - we lost 3-1 to Bosnia and fatigue was sited as the main factor. The Aussie commentators have so far been phenomenal, very fair and knowledgeable and they're MUCH more objective than some of us. This was the 1st time I saw them be seriously frustrated and annoyed and complain about a team's playing style in spite of its strengths and potential.

There was practically no pressure on our defense in the last 10 minutes of the game (or the 1st 15 for that matter), because we pushed up just a little bot and started making use of our offense. Had we stuck with more of that in the beginning of the game, scored an early goal and switched to a defensive counter-attacking style, it would have been a different story, but we can't leave must-win games to a moment of luck in the 91st minute.

On that note, my issue with CQ isn't his defensive tactics or his knowledge at all - I'm pretty happy with both of those. My issue is that he relies on the same tactics a bit too much at times and unnecessarily. And the comparison shouldn't be with someone like Ghotbi who had one year of coaching under his belt and ZERO international experience as a coach. The comparison should always be made with our full potential and how close a coach can get to that.

But if you must make a comparison with Ghotbi, he also managed to get 9 points in the group game with a single goal against us and we did eventually lose to fatigue in the 2nd round. So it's a bit silly to do that comparison particularity at this juncture and when fatigue is our biggest concern going into the next round.

To sum it all up, we can win this tournament with this squad and CQ's general tactics and he can do GREAT things with Iran in the future. He just needs to believe in TM a bit more and take a little bit more chance on offense - not 800% more or to completely change the tactics he's comfortable with, 20-30% more offense and a bit more pressing and creativity would do, make all of us a lot happier and achieve even better results for TM.

[dejagah_fan]

How comes Ando needs a translator? Did he forget his English?

http://youtu.be/0FMFQidAk2A very very no comment

[OFFSIDE_1]

H

To sum it up without doing the extensiv analysis:
Iran displayed an awful performance, no hunger or motivation, unable to put together more than 3-4 passes and so on..
This is actually nothing new, usually we tend to overestimate how to say, how good of a team Iran actually is. When Iran we win we idolize the team and make them all kings, and when we lose we think of them as shitty players. This is reality foks, we've been outplayed for most part of these 3 group stage matches. Today we got away with a lucky win. we used to kill these arab teams in the era of bagheri, minavand, azizi and kia, and now we're celebrating a narrow victory over uae. But this is reality, you shouldnt get to upset when the team lifting the trophy isnt Iran (god forbid). Unlike every other team in the world, Irans football isnt supported or nurtured, all we got are fakked up fans who cherish the team when victorious and banishes them when on the losing end.
I will edit this post if Iran reaches semifinal, cause like every other iranian fan I'll start believing we can, if with a liiiiittle bit of luck, win the World Cup in 4 years..

In your non-extensive 2000 word analysis, did you see a bagheri, Kia, minavand or azizi on the pitch today?

[OFFSIDE_1]

When Qatar lost 4-1 to UAE many analysed that UAE with those midfielders have become a good team. I was remembering Qatar's 5-1 loss to Uzbakestan in WCQ and I knew what an effort Qatar was making to pull Iran out of world cup. Before Iran Qatar match the coach of Qatar said we played too friendly against UAE but Iran would be different. And they were different. Say what you want about todays game we did a good job and toped the 3 Arab teams that were united against us.
I thoght we were not so accurate in out passes and finishings but we bocked greate for UAE's Omar and other good midfielders. I think they may win Japan. It won't be totally unrealistic.

Qatar does not intentionally lose the first match just to screw Iran. That is just nonsense

[TheBoss]

Probably my two favourite TM players of all time - the other being Mahdavikia - interview at the end of the match.

Tehranto jan, This is from IRIB, is there a non IRIB version of these interviews?

[vatanparast]

Just to make sure everyone understands my post i will make it clear that the rest of this post os sarcastic.
Yes all iranians are geniuses and cq is a lucky moron. All iranians are better soccer players than messi and their corpses would score. Ore goals than ali daei did. Yes teammelli stinks and is only lucky. Tm has gotten lucky against argentina to only let in one goal, was lucky to tie nigeria and beat korea 3 times in a row. If we were such geniuses then how come our nation is isolated and we have all these sanctions against us. When will you realize that we know nothing and admit it. Cq was lucky to coach real madrid and portugal and assist ferguson. You people are unreal.
Cq is a genius. Not all our players would be bench warmers but most wouldnt even be a bench warmer. Our players arent nearly as talented as kia karimi daei and co, but our team as a whole is way better due to learning how to stay disciplined and follow coaches orders. You guys forget our loss to bahrain already? We would struggle against arabs but now we win every game. Uae were allowed to keep posession and they just kept passing the ball around between the back line. They werent playing football, they were just warming up by passing. Lol. What did those arabs do with the ball. Nothing. Abdulrahman had a few moments but that was it.
I like everyone else on this forum know nothing about anything but believe in our players and our team and our awesome coach. I agree this game wasnt pretty but cq chose to play this way as uae assumed we would try and attack and they would counter but since cq surprised them they didnt know what to do other than pass the ball around. Uae played for a tie and lost. Iran basically plays like bruce lee asking attackers to attack first and invites them to attack. Imagine bruce lee with his palm facing up and his fingers moving in sucha way to invite the attackers then he beats everybody silly and so hard that they dont know what hit them. Again uae had the ball because they were allowed to have the ball. That was cqs plan. You could see cq up and upset and yelling so be sure that our less experienced players werent following his instructions well but with only twomfriendlies and hardly any preparation iran is in the next round unbeaten and top of the group and haghighi could have read an entire encyclopedia each game.
Long live iran and tm and cq

[TheBoss]

OH MY GOD, you guys, check out this video

Reaction of Iranian fans in Melbourne, after iran scores the goal against UAE, the video starts a couple seconds before the goal is scored and you can feel the tension and then gucci scores and the room explodes in cheers :

https://www.facebook.com/video.php?v=507355669407685

[Abtin]

^Daamn, when you talk about explossion

[TheBoss]

someone should download all of these clips and make a long video of iranian fans in Australia, they have been exceptional. Video editors and makers of PFDC get to work guys!

[alaph]

someone was asking for this earlier
https://gfycat.com/WarmDeepDevilfish

[TheBoss]

someone was asking for this earlier
https://gfycat.com/WarmDeepDevilfish

man, we haven't had a goalkeeper with this much confidence and sass since Ahmadreza Abedzadeh himself. Haghighi is such an asset. many people were saying after Rahmati was kicked out of TM (because of his doing) that we are screwed but now we have Haghighi, who is 100000x better than rahmati and a young promising goalie in Beiranvand. (and let's not forget Hagighi himself is still very young)