Still waiting for CQ to convince

[Team Melli Fan]

CQ has impressed me defensively, but not offensively.

[Keano]

I make it short!
I respect everyone's oppinion and point of view, but as far as my view is concerned:

I have never seen in my entire life, since the first day I started to watch Iranian football, since many many TM generaitons ago, a TM as organized, as defensively reliable, as tactically smart and convincing TM as this one!

CQ has impressed me defensively, but not offensively.

Best offense is a good defense, without a good defense a great offense means absolutely nothing. One step at a time, our defense plays formidably, our offense scores when it matters and wins when it executes the match and its results. What else do we want from the offense? To perform goal fiesta?

[Team Melli Fan]

Best offense is a good defense, without a good defense a great offense means absolutely nothing. One step at a time, our defense plays formidably, our offense scores when it matters and wins when it executes the match and its results. What else do we want from the offense? To perform goal fiesta?

To control the flow of the game, to hustle into open position, some triangle passing, one-two touch ground passing, holding possession for more than 10 seconds. These are all things we lack. We had a little over 20% possession after half time. I know possession doesn't mean everything, but for a dominant team like Iran to see the ball that little is a joke. On the plus side, we're effective.

[Siavash]

I remember many many games against Arabic national teams when we attack the entire game but ended up losing and/or tie the match. Meaning Arabs always played compact defense which frustrated TM and in many cases we did not win. None of the coaches at the time seem to have an answer in how to penetrate such compact defense, until CQ showed up and solve the problem. CQ allow them to attack us and that opened the back door for our devastating counter attacks. In all of the three games that TM played at AFC our goalie was never under pressure and our superb defense did not allow any goals. Our counter attacks put tremendous pressure on our opponents such that they were afraid to attack us fully. In short I enjoy watching TM playing a meaningful soccer that is fruitful.

[maly3648]

With all due respect, with the kind of messy preparation we had (for obvious reasons of lack of funds due to sanctions and mismanagement from IFF), what Iran is achieving is just beyond anything we could have expected them. The most pleasant news is that we really have a good defense. The second good news is that it seems we are slowly heading towards finding good forwarders, although they still need experience, their potential is much better than what we had in the past (after Daei, Hashemian era). The bad news is that our midfielders are still not very consistent, can do really stupid decision making and unfortunately, without them, forwarders are not fed and therefore, we ll find ourselves totally nowhere like against UAE in part of second half. We also miss too many opportunities in front of the goal, Jahanbaksh was a disappointment for me so far ... This team still needs to play more and more together and they will definitely get better. I still think we are a bit too short to be able to win the CUP as Japan and Australia look more stable than us but i think we have definitely chances.

[Ab-Gosht]

LOL

he scored an exact copy vs T&T and they tried it in the WC as well. Its as rehearsed as they come baby

[Hadi]

DD you continue to amaze me.

What goal qualifies in your books as result of "rehearsed and planned move"?
Only if we score like Arsenal or Barcelona after 30+ passes and one twos?

I think we did have a plan and every single win in the tournament was a direct result of the plan that CQ had and had rehearsed. Now, I am not saying this was the best approach. Perhaps we could have played differently and gotten better results especially versus Bahrain and Qatar.
But we did have a plan and we did not play randomly: The fact that CQ rested 4 key players, added them in the dying minutes and we got a goal from a corner was EXACTLY our plan. If we had scored after a string of 20 passes, I would have been shocked and definitely said that it wasn't planned. The fact that we isolated UAE's strikers and put immense pressure on their play makers was EXACTLY the plan and was rehearsed.

Here is my analysis of the Group Stages:


1) Backdrop

Team Melli came to Australia severely under prepared. This meant that there was no way for our team to dominate opponents from the get go. We did not even know our best starting 11 and had no practices whatsoever. The only feasible option we had was to build on our WC backbone and tactics since it was well rehearsed. This was also made more difficult after we lost Beikzadeh and Montazeri in the last minute. That is what you saw versus Bahrain. A team which played very similar to the World Cup. Good pressure, solid defense and lots of running. But lacking a passing game, creativity, high defensive line and marauding full-backs.

Adding to this, Team Melli came to Aus with lots of Hashiyeh. Almost no support from the ministry and IR politicians. Vatani coaches (like Azizi, MK, Jalali etc) dying to see the team fail and that saga with Ali Karimi.

All this meant that realistically we did not have much chance of winning anything. CQ knows that he needs results and basically his job is to salvage whatever he can from a train wreck. If you were expecting free flowing "Perssshian" football, you should probably be feeling disappointed by now.

2) The reality of our players abilities

Here is a bitter reality: the technical difference between Iran and a team like UAE was non existent, and in some cases, UAE players were individually superior in terms of technique. Our players individually were not superior footballers. We won because of our tactics, not because of our individual abilities. Same can be said versus Qatar and Bahrain.
In football, if your team is really individually superior, its impossible to just have 30% possession or get outpassed 400 to 100.

UAE players on average had better Ball control, passing, dribbling, first touch. I don't know how people still say we are winning matches through "individual brilliance?"....non of our players (barring Ashkan) is really individually brilliant and superior to Asian players. Gone are the days when we had dribblers, passers and players who could win a match with a moment of magic.

Instead, Iran's modern footballers are better athletes. Physically strong, good stamina, determined, organized and more importantly they have a no nonsense defensive style.

3) What CQ did

so we have already established the backdrop of what TM's arrival in Melbourne. And we know CQ's aim is to get results not play like Arsenal. So what he did, to me, was brilliant. He knew our defense is far far superior than the strike force of any teams we meet in the group stages. So he went for clean sheets, and he got 3 of them.
in 270 minutes of football, our goal was not really threatened.And that is because Asian (Arab) teams are unable to carve open defenses. sure UAE passed it pretty in the middle, but that was basically it. They could not get near our goal often enough. If our defensive style in WC was risky, it Asian level its a guarantee of earning "some" points. There is no way for Asian footballers to effectively beat a well trained defensive line.
So by playing a defensive game, and banking on counter attacks and set pieces, CQ aimed to advance from the group stages first. You may ask: so what if we go through? surely we will fail versus teams like Aus and Japan. Answer is: distant water cant save near fire. CQ will handle that obstacle when he gets there.

Some people here think that CQ plays his team this way by choice. But the truth is, he plays this way out of necessity. The technical ability of our team is simply not good enough to push forward, play a passing game and be attack oriented. our roster is more suited for pressing, disruptive play and set pieces.

Just imagine if Iran had played an attacking game. Perhaps 3 attacking midfielders or two striker. and Bahrain had sat back to defend. I doubt we had the ability to open their defense, and chances are they could have scored on us through some counter attack or a turnover, something which we have seen often from Iran's midfield.

[Keano]

To control the flow of the game, to hustle into open position, some triangle passing, one-two touch ground passing, holding possession for more than 10 seconds.

But din't UAE do all of the above? What happened? Nothing, not even a shot on goal. Isn't that what Spain did? But they couldn't even make it out of teir group stage.

We defend greatly and score to win the matches. As far as I can remember our football history, having such solid and well disciplined defense is just unprecedented!

One characteristic this team holds, for its predecessors didn't, is its unity and organized team work. In the past for the most part our football relied on its star players and game changers, whereas this team never relies on a player, today we can safely say should any of our players get injured, suspended etc. we will have another good player to fill in the place, in other words this team's success is not based upon a few players. For sure this is the least star-studded Iran team in years, yet one of the most organized (If not the most organized) team we have ever had!

C'mon even Mila joon agrees with everything I just said!

[IPG]

1- Thank you for wasting my time reading all this crap. Allthough luckily i stopped half way

2- As the legend Cruyff said luck is something you force. When u win game in game out and never concede a goal and JUST HAPPEN TO WIN ALL GAMES like that against all these different teams in the same way you can hardly call it luck. Its a tactic that has worked. (3 times in 6 months against SKorea alone)

3- Just because you let the other team have the ball does not mean anything when they cant even have one proper chance with it !!!!

4- With the prepration Iran has had and looking at the material we have one can not conclude anything other than CQ has done an amazing job with Iran

5- The number of goals received, the number of games won, making it to the WC, tying one of the best teams in Africa and playing like we did against the likes of Argentina, qualifying for the AC with the stats we did, winning the group stage with zero goals conceded and having given away very very few scoring oppurtunities is al the proof we need.

6- and most importantly STOP BEING SUCH A NEGATIVE SELF HATING PERSIAN when moral is good, the results are there, the spirits are up and we have a great chance of making the finals.

[Ardalan]

Ye chizi hast va in be nazar man mohemtarin chize: vakoneshe ma chejori khahad bood AGAR yek gol bekhorim? Tavanaie feshaar avordan rooye gole harif daarim? Baa Bosnie ye gol khordim va hame chiz rikht be ham. Doroste ke bazikonhaa goftan pas az mosaabeghe baa Argentine kheili khaste bodand, amma shiveye baazie khodemon raa mitonim avaz konim? Chon vaghti adam gol mikhore dige nemitone bekeshe aghaab.

[KeonKish]

Re: Still waiting for CQ to convince

Ye chizi hast va in be nazar man mohemtarin chize: vakoneshe ma chejori khahad bood AGAR yek gol bekhorim? Tavanaie feshaar avordan rooye gole harif daarim? Baa Bosnie ye gol khordim va hame chiz rikht be ham. Doroste ke bazikonhaa goftan pas az mosaabeghe baa Argentine kheili khaste bodand, amma shiveye baazie khodemon raa mitonim avaz konim? Chon vaghti adam gol mikhore dige nemitone bekeshe aghaab.

I wouldn't say Hamechi beham rikht. They are actually quite lucky on most of their goals. But I get your point, I'm sure cq is thinking about this.

Sent from my HTC One using Tapatalk 2

[euphory]

boro baba

[metallica69]

I agree and disagree with you Dr.

As many mentioned here, its more to do with what CQ has at his disposal. Our league is not producing anything worth mentioning and that's clear when they play in the AC CL, I don't remember the last time we had a club team dominating the Asian clubs. We look at all our so called top clubs and cant see any of them playing the type of fluid football you or I would like to see.

My only problem with CQ is that we cant have one strategy only. What happens if we are two goals down in the first half, what do we do then if we cant keep the ball. The UAE game should have been the game were we could be more adventures up front in my opinion.

With that said, today we are seeing a team that is well organized and the players seem to agree with CQ that this is the way forward. Not to mention that we are currently the best defensive team in Asia and that no easy task.

Also nice to see you back after a long time

[persian-eagle-13]

As long as we win our games I am convinced. Not to mention the solid defense we have developed under his reign. Credit must be given when it's due. Some people often wait for the moment to jump the gun and crucify. Did we play unattractive football? somewhat yes we did. Did we not win while playing somewhat unattractive football? yes we won. Do I prefer attractive football over result? Hell no I don't!

can't remember any time in the past that TM had such a organized defense!! we always had problems in the defense. Defense will always wins you games because it keeps you in the game!

i agree we had one of the worst games against UAE, but games what, the defense kept us in the game and we won!!

[Nader25]