Post-Match Sweden-Iran

[teammelli8080]

I thought we played alright.

Seriously some of you need to remember that we are Iran and not Germany.

Iran: Skill level like Paraguay, expectations like Brazil.

[hzv]

the 3-1 result was harsh and the 3rd goal was uncalled for and first goal haghighi should ve saved. i thought tm did not play bad as sweden was a real gardan koloft team they were clearly the superior side physically.this was a much better test for our team than chile. europeans play a whole other game,the kind of game where we are still very far from.

[koorosh]

Not too bad!

Okay, what did people expect? For Iran to go to Sweden, play the national team, with Zlatan, in their capital city and beat them?

We played pretty good overall. The third goal didn't reflect the game. Sweden didn't run the game at all and we almost made it 2-2 with a sneaky little flick.

Lots of good analysis in the previous posts...There were spells in the game where we had the upper hand.

Good learning opportunity against a physical team who are very strong aerially, as we expected.

Clearly we have advanced our football in the CQ era, despite the paucity of strong offensive players.

[ArminSh]

Idk if this was posted earlier but here it is again if so..

Zlatan Ibrahimovic post-match comments: "I really feel like this was an amazing game tonight even though the game was mostly in their favor, but this doesnt matter because you want to play and enjoy the game with your teammates."

Says all coming from this guy.

[Ali.Karimi79]

Ok guy, i am sitting in the Hotel Lobby right now and had my breakfast.
There has been enough posts about the game so I will just do what most of you didn't expect.

I admit it: shojaei did fantastic! I saw it myself. That's why he drives me crazy, he can do amazing things with the ball......once every 4 years ffs.
Anyways, since I couldn't get his shirt for Kiarash I took this picture

[PersianLegion]

Ok guy, i am sitting in the Hotel Lobby right now and had my breakfast.
There has been enough posts about the game so I will just do what most of you didn't expect.

I admit it: shojaei did fantastic! I saw it myself. That's why he drives me crazy, he can do amazing things with the ball......once every 4 years ffs.
Anyways, since I couldn't get his shirt for Kiarash I took this picture
[ATTACH]15756[/ATTACH]

Is that you in the picture? if yes you sound like Masoud from that angle!

[Ali.Karimi79]

Yes That's me showing Masouds number in honor of his good performance since people labeled me a hater. I am not a hater, I'm just a rightful critic of him. But he delivers like he did yesterday I admit it.
Peace!

[shahname]

I think J. Hosseini was terrible in this match, especially in the first half he was directly or indirectly to be blamed for both Swedish goals!!

See the highlights of the match and you can see how he let go of Zlatan in the penalty box instead of continue covering him and thereby allowing him to head the ball easily and score the first goal!!

Also on the 2. goal, instead of covering Berg who scored the goal, he went in the goal and stood on the goal line!! He was watching football instead of playing on both goals. He played better in the 2. half though.

I think Hosseini also has to retire now. He is already 33/34 and not that sharp either.

[mayhem]

I just watched the match and have to say, the scoreline doesn't do us justice. I haven't seen Iran play with such confidence and quality in a while. If only we played with the same quality at the asian cup.

I just hate it how when every player on the pitch is 'clicking' our so called best player, Dejagah has a bad day. He had one good move and 20 mistakes which ruined the flow of an attack.

What the hell, just like the Nigeria game. He's not a big game player I think, it gets to his head or something, I don't know.

[Doctor DOOM]

I think it was a decent game by Iran. I'm happy CQ didn't opt for the bus system and came to play. So we came to play and show the Chile game was not a fluke. Especially whenever we chose to keep the ball on the ground and use the width of the pitch, ... as opposed to the times our players' brains received no blood so they just licked the ball high up field, which played to the Swedes' game plan.
I think maybe the result could have been slightly kinder had we kept our emotions in control and used logic a bit more. Meaning if we tried more moves on the ground and less useless crosses into the Swedes' 18 which were almost entirely met by the tall Swedish defense. Basically we just didn't have an answer to the opponents' HEIGHT & PHYSICAL STRENGTH. This showed all over the pitch, be it up field or near our goal, where we conceded the goals only due to lack of height and coming seconds in physical battles.

That's not to say we couldn't have done better. For example this strength and height factor was known by all before the game. Why wasn't Sadeghi, who among all our defenders has somewhat an equal chance at this, sit on the bench? I would be more critical of this had it been an official game. But I suppose CQ wanted to give Pouraliganji a start against a top team. So we'll let it go.

I assume these two factors also decided the use of Montazeri at the RB. He did have some very bright moves going up, but in defense he had a mixed display of good as well as bad defensive showings.


And we looked comfortable going forward for most parts, with Dejagah despite showing some rust (probably due to where he plays his club football, which tends to make players lazy), he actually had some bright patches and looked at home facing some very big names of European football. I only wish he'd get back to his old form.

Amiri the newcomer continued to impress with his skills and pace. I would be very surprised if he doesn't get a couple of offers from scouts. And he's just an IPL player, the same beleaguered league that some love to put down. There are plenty of gems in our IPL, if the coach decides to trust them.

Shojaei however surprised me by having a pretty good showing. Some nifty passes that reminded us of the shojaei of 6-7 years back. His display was good. Nothing earth shattering, but given his recent years' displays, this one was laudable.

RGN is slowly showing some rust, just like Dejagah. But it is also the fact that he is ALONE up field, which makes scoring very difficult as it is. But given the height and physicality of the Swedish defense, we just can't begrudge him much, although he did try valiantly. He also had a very clever, cheeky tough that bounced off the post, which shows his quick thinking and feet, as well as brightness in decision making (if only he used this in choosing where he plays too !!!!)

Nekounam and Ando also did ok. Nothing to brag about. But then again it was always going to be a tough ask facing a much tougher and taller team 3 days after meeting a very good Chile team. They did lack a few touches in distribution though. And I just have to question the persistent need to crossing high balls. We just didn't need to as we showed more success in keeping it low. In fact our goal was the result of using our ball skills and pace, instead of playing to the Swedes' strength.

Defense wasn't too bad if we consider our shortcomings (pun intended). They did as best as they could to quell the barrage of physical attacks. But we just didn't have an answer to those two deciding factors. However o didn't appreciate zlatan's brutish and thuggish behavior. The idiot needs to calm down. Ass.


Haghighi is well, as I have always said, he's an ok keeper. Nothing really fantastic. As I said in F+ forum, he seems to be indecisive how to choose his parries, punches, collections, ... .
Given his age i'd say he's worth investing on. Otherwise ....
I think we should start to look at Beiranvand a little more seriously.


All in all it was a good outing for our team that very rarely faces such opponents. But more importantly, I have to say thank God there's noone as tall or as physical as the Swedes in Asia. So I'm not too worried about the score line. Hood learning experience for all.

[Doctor DOOM]

On the absence or presence of jahanbakhsh and azmoun as a few chaps have brought up

I am not convinced about this thing that many bring about absence of JB and azmoun. I mean are we seriously saying this? Against Sweden? When on tone very same day these two couldn't get the better of a bunch Saudi amateurs?

I am not saying these two are bad players. Far from it. These two are very gifted. But everything has to be considered within reality. They couldn't have much of an impact against a bunch of youngsters (even if they were Africans in reality), so based on what exactly do we believe they could get the better of Swedish giants?
We just don't know. So lets not presume such things.

[Kiarash]

I am not saying these two are bad players. Far from it. These two are very gifted. But everything has to be considered within reality. They couldn't have much of an impact against a bunch of youngsters (even if they were Africans in reality), so based on what exactly do we believe they could get the better of Swedish giants?

We just don't know. So lets not presume such things.

Ronaldo is one of the best players in the world, but his teammates at Portugal NT sucked badly which was shown in the World Cup 2014 and they made him look bad too. Pathetic 3rd place in the group after USA and Germany so they got eliminated early.

Same goes for Azmoun and Jahanbakhsh. When you have mediocre colleagues, you won't be able to produce much. Football stays a team sport and not an one man show.

[Kavian]

This was one of the better performances I have seen from TM in terms of playing a fluid football. But I believe CQ proved an important point in this game and that is performance vs. results.
Iran did not adopt the usual tight defensive tactics, passed the ball around and created chances, but it conceded 3 times.
Which do you rather?

[IranTM]

If you didn't see the game, maybe you should avoid making assumptions.

It was a pretty open game. Both sides attacking, although Sweden was more efficient/incisive.

It's a fair assumption based on all the previous games we played.

[Bagg10]

It's a fair assumption based on all the previous games we played.

Did you happen to catch the Chile game?