2016 AFC Champions League

[Kavian]

I am tired of facing Al Koft and Al Zaghnabot time after time ... You even get confused with duplicate team names like Al Nasr vs Al Nassr

.... AFC would need to abolish this east and west groupings of teams... mix them up for more excitment. It will only improve the level of football and will be more fair !!

[Gotham]

I am tired of facing Al Koft and Al Zaghnabot time after time ... You even get confused with duplicate team names like Al Nasr vs Al Nassr

.... AFC would need to abolish this east and west groupings of teams... mix them up for more excitment. It will only improve the level of football and will be more fair !!

the problem I believe is the travelling cost. Asia is poor as hell.

[Z Joon]

[Kiarash]

I hate the West and East separated format, it ruins all excitement for me. It would be much more fun if we played Japanese, Korean and Australian teams to see how competitive our clubs are against them. Tired of facing Al-Tokhm each year.

[PSGman#19]

I hate the West and East separated format, it ruins all excitement for me. It would be much more fun if we played Japanese, Korean and Australian teams to see how competitive our clubs are against them. Tired of facing Al-Tokhm each year.

The same. at least before we could face them from quarter. Now we have to wait an unlikely final.

the most stupid is you can have these kind of match after the group stage : "sepahan/zob" "tractor/naft" "Al-Saudi/Al-KSA" and "Al-Saudiarabia/Al-jeddah" while you have 4 spanish (or english) teams in UCL that are protected until quarter of final.

AFC isn't poor with all these cheick (except if ben williams asked too much) so the best is :

- either keep the current format with a mix of east and west just after the group stage. From quarter teams of a same league can be drawn against each other.
- or seperate completly East and West. West Champions league would start from September N and finish in May N+1 like european leagues, iranian leagues and arab leagues. Either champions of West ACL and East ACL enter directly in the world cup of clubs, or they play a play-off just before the competition.

Either you split completely, either you don't but you have to assume it. Don't stay with this sh1tty hydrid format

[kia]

The same. at least before we could face them from quarter. Now we have to wait an unlikely final.

the most stupid is you can have these kind of match after the group stage : "sepahan/zob" "tractor/naft" "Al-Saudi/Al-KSA" and "Al-Saudiarabia/Al-jeddah" while you have 4 spanish (or english) teams in UCL that are protected until quarter of final.

AFC isn't poor with all these cheick (except if ben williams asked too much) so the best is :

- either keep the current format with a mix of east and west just after the group stage. From quarter teams of a same league can be drawn against each other.
- or seperate completly East and West. West Champions league would start from September N and finish in May N+1 like european leagues, iranian leagues and arab leagues. Either champions of West ACL and East ACL enter directly in the world cup of clubs, or they play a play-off just before the competition.

Either you split completely, either you don't but you have to assume it. Don't stay with this sh1tty hydrid format

Yeah. They are going backwards. I remember we played Kawasaki in semis & Urawa Reds in final.

[Kavian]

the problem I believe is the travelling cost. Asia is poor as hell.

That means AFC would need to find ways to generate more money from ACL and give teams some share of the income so that they can afford to go a longer distance.

[teammelli91]

Naft should be cautious of Al Ahli. They suddenly landed in their group. You could only imagine how much their asses are burning from Naft eliminating them in Saudi Arabia and having a national celebration.

Naft need to sign a solid centre back. Not saying there's anything wrong with their defenders, but in order to get out of the group they need to pick it up defensively. They are a good team and are students under a good coach and coaching staff.

Also, Zob Ahan should sign a few players in needed positions. The league starts in 2 months.

[teammelli91]

I'm gonna take a wild guess and say that Eamon Zayed may be going to Zob Ahan.

[babak_iran]

decent draw for sepahan comparing to the other editions of ACL. sucks if we have to face zobahan in the next round, they have a shot of making a deep run in this tournament.

[PSGman#19]

Hiroshima won agaisnt the African champion in world cup of clubs and will play against River Plate in semi final
Ghanzhou evergrande won against mexican club america and will play against Barcelona in semi final.

And stupid AFC keep us playing against low level arabs in ACL.

[teammelli91]

The question is, can Zob Ahan do it again?

[littlepersia17]

2016 AFC Champions League

Hiroshima won agaisnt the African champion in world cup of clubs and will play against River Plate in semi final
Ghanzhou evergrande won against mexican club america and will play against Barcelona in semi final.

And stupid AFC keep us playing against low level arabs in ACL.

I think they can't do that because of the travelling costs.

And travelling hours can be very long. Can you imagine a Iranian Club coming over and play an Australian team (15 hour flights) in midweek, then play in the IPL on a saturday

[Nariman]

I heavily agree with everyone complaining about AFC regulations, its massive BS. The Asian Champios League is quite messed up and they don’t seem to care about it. Always playing the same dirty teams and the stupid annoying break midway through the tournament are really screwing the entire tension and excitement! How much I would love to see our clubs regularly playing in some modern stadiums on the other side of Asia with fair & clean teams that actually have fans..Instead of all this "Allah Allah" chants by one guy with a homemade loudspeaker, trying to compensate the silence of the empty stadium. Hell, I would even plan a trip and maybe catch a game from Perspolis playing in Japan or Korea for example, but there is no excitement to see some boring 8-0er country.

Anyway, back to our chances this time around. To be honest, I don’t see too many positive aspects as none of our teams seem to be fully prepared for the games.

Sepahan:
wasted too much time with useless Faraki. Just recently lost their best/key player and hired a new coach, who needs a lot of time to get the team back on track as he has no experience coaching in Asia, let alone Iran.

Tractor:
also struggles these days and hired a new coach the fans don’t seem to like. With Ghale they got themselves a "trophy" bitch who mostly cares about himself, rather than the team. They might improve their performance in PGL, but at international level Ghale has always been a huge failure, even when he had the best players.

Naft:
Actually has a decent squad and promising coach, but they are clearly out of form this season. Mansourian still has not found a way to revive his team, although it seems like they are improving slowly, but it might be too late.

Zob Ahan:
Certainly the best team out of the 4 led by another promising coach Golmohammdi. However IMO they don’t have the necessary experienced players to succeed in ACL, it will even be new for Golmohammadi to coach at international stage.



That being said, we already have witnessed that PGL performances say absolutely nothing - often teams’ perform differently in the CL. I still expect Zob Ahan to make it out of their Group and hope for Naft Tehran to be the surprise. Sepahan might make it as well due to the CLUB having enough experience & knowledge about ACL. Ghale has the chance to finally prove himself at this level, let's see how he does.

[Amin_]

No Iranian team can have "the best players" when it comes down to ACL when you are facing Saudi, Qatari, Emirati and Chinese clubs who are spending tens of millions to get the best foreign players and coaches available (for Asian standards).

Some of these Asian clubs are spending big cash and bring in players like Gyan, while we are trying to compete with them with a bunch of domestic players and 6th rated foreigners who haven't been paid for months!

An Iranian team reaching the semi-finals is a huge deal in this day and time! It's like Dutch football and the European competitions nowadays. No matter how much talent you have, you simply can not compete with teams like Bayern, Chelsea, Real, Barca, Man City, PSG etc. anymore at such big stages! PSV having reached the second round of the CL is a HUGE deal in Holland, while 2 decades ago Ajax was ruling the European fields

Let's be realistic now.