TM-News-Vol. 6

[Ostad_Goosfand]

Congrats everyone. But for some reason i dont feel like i did when we qualified to WC2006, 2014, 2018... maybe its cuz it was already a done deal or maybe cuz none of the games where exciting enough. Anyways i hope to get a better feeling at the WC in Qatar

Just remind yourself of how we were almost eliminated and that will make it more exciting. The wins against Bahrain and Iraq to make this round were more exciting for sure

[naderb94]

Congrats everyone. But for some reason i dont feel like i did when we qualified to WC2006, 2014, 2018... maybe its cuz it was already a done deal or maybe cuz none of the games where exciting enough. Anyways i hope to get a better feeling at the WC in Qatar

I get your feeling.. Part of it was the empty Azadi in comparison to 2018, part of is that we already knew we were gonna qualify.

[BacheLot]

Congrats everyone. But for some reason i dont feel like i did when we qualified to WC2006, 2014, 2018... maybe its cuz it was already a done deal or maybe cuz none of the games where exciting enough. Anyways i hope to get a better feeling at the WC in Qatar

yea, me too sorta same..
pretty sure its because qualification to WC was already a foregone conclusion ..!!? and also Not looking too much forward to piss away a lotta money to go to freaking GUTTER Desert for the WC..!

[inarsenewetrust]

yea, me too sorta same..
pretty sure its because qualification to WC was already a foregone conclusion ..!!? and also Not looking too much forward to piss away a lotta money to go to freaking GUTTER Desert for the WC..!

just think of it as home world cup. You fly to tehran, chill for a week, hit the game day of. Then you go to kish, chill out, hit the next game day of.

[Ab-Gosht]

Great game and happy ending.

Since we don't have U23 team and a coach yet, may be Skocic should invite best of U23 players for the remaining matches.,

yes and lets say goodbye to pot 2 for world cup as well = saygoodbye to decent chances fo reaching last 16!

ANyone knows if iran wants to make last 16, a fair draw is needed

[inarsenewetrust]

yes and lets say goodbye to pot 2 for world cup as well = saygoodbye to decent chances fo reaching last 16!
ANyone knows if iran wants to make last 16, a fair draw is needed

why? Because we call up likes of fallah,khodabandelou,hosseinzadeh instead of the highly influential Faraji, Kamyabinia and torabi? what sort of stupid logic is that.

The aforementioned trio are non factors for TM. Instead we can bring in some (highly talented!) young players who have been performing much better in the league for weaker sides anyways and advance their development and integrate them with TM at least in some camps and training sessions.

[Omid177]

Congrats everyone. But for some reason i dont feel like i did when we qualified to WC2006, 2014, 2018... maybe its cuz it was already a done deal or maybe cuz none of the games where exciting enough. Anyways i hope to get a better feeling at the WC in Qatar

I agree. We feel that way because of our weak group but nevertheless, a victory over Iraq is always very satisfying.

I will celebrate when we win all the remaining matches and get into pot 2

[milad_b]

Shoja khalilzadeh will miss the next game for receiving yellow card against Iraq and Syria. someone please tell Team melli staff so they don't mess up again.

Mehdi is on yellow
Sardar is on yellow
Ghoddos is on yellow
Saeed Ezza is on yellow
Mohammadi is on yellow
Moharami Is also on yellow

I'll be very cautious with these players as we need them against south korea. South korea game is very very very important and anything less than a win, would reducts points from us.

[ABalls]

I agree. We feel that way because of our weak group but nevertheless, a victory over Iraq is always very satisfying.

I will celebrate when we win all the remaining matches and get into pot 2

I submit we feel that way because we know that qualifying to the WC is what SHOULD BE EXPECTED of Iran. Now getting to the Round of 16 is the true task.

[Iranianarsenal11]

Shoja khalilzadeh will miss the next game for receiving yellow card against Iraq and Syria. someone please tell Team melli staff so they don't mess up again.

Mehdi is on yellow
Sardar is on yellow
Ghoddos is on yellow
Saeed Ezza is on yellow
Mohammadi is on yellow
Moharami Is also on yellow

I'll be very cautious with these players as we need them against south korea. South korea game is very very very important and anything less than a win, would reducts points from us.

With all due respect to Shoja, good riddence.

Yazdani is miles better at this stage (if Majid isn't cleared to play) and like St. Mark mentioned earlier, our U23 guys are not worse than Shoja at all...

[milad_b]

With all due respect to Shoja, good riddence.

Yazdani is miles better at this stage (if Majid isn't cleared to play) and like St. Mark mentioned earlier, our U23 guys are not worse than Shoja at all...

I agree with you on this and also Yazdani looks very promising and his physique is much better than shoja.

[Golefarsi]

why dont we have U23 team and coach? was it not Mahdavikia who was the coach? What happend?

[Kavian]

The real job just started!

Success in World Cup will only come when there is proper planning and execution from now till that time.

That means looking at potential new players and have a plan to incorporate them into the team, working on gaps and weak spots, arranging friendlies, and keeping a regular schedule for training camps.

The WC is in winter and teams don't have the luxury of having long training camps.

All of this is too big for Akhound. We need someone who can do this. Someone like CQ who has balls to stand up against odds.

[inarsenewetrust]

they need to start planning right now on friendlies.

The number is not important. There will be limited opportunities for friendlies in new fifa calendar (per the official site, 6 to be exact)

https://digitalhub.fifa.com/m/88176d...bso2tz-pdf.pdf

4 matches from may 30- Jun 14
2 matches from 19-27th of December

If we can get 5 of these 6 that is good enough, but critical is quality! At this stage, Syria + Oman + Uzbekistan will not show us a SINGLE thing about this team and what it needs to address to be successful in getting out of group in qatar.

We need at the very least, solid opponents.

Venezuela is an easy one. They have a solid young team (not ready to really come close to qualifying this time round but next cycle they should be quite competitive) basically almost exclusively based in europe, MLS, or Brazil. We have great relations with them and they will simulate the likes of ecuador, peru, mexico, colombia, etc. We can play them in europe/tehran without much issue.

From Africa we had previously arranged mali friendly some months ago. They have a great young team as well with many euro stars and importantly very strong midfield that would test ours. IFF should get that one back on ASAP as it would simulate any african opposition minus the north africans very well.

From North Africa they need to try to use CQ connection, its our best bet. Egypt would be a great match for fans and the players/staff alike. Tunisia could also be very doable. One of those 2 would suffice.

From europe is where we need to focus the most. Dragan needs to call anybody and everybody he knows in croatia to get that done, it would be a massive boost and bypass a lot of sanctions related BS. A real top test.
Turkey is also a very attainable option they should pursue. Logistically very attractive and they have the star power to test us, even if as a team they are not a great unit (but have chance still to qualify).

In addition to these, other strong eastern EU options include Ukraine/Russia/Serbia/Bosnia/Macedonia (we already played bosnia recently though).

Ideal : Croatia, Venezuela, Egypt/Tunisia, Mali, Turkey

Lets see if we can do anything close to that. In some ways covid situation, lack of days helps us as short time window will eliminate a lot of commercial/sponsoring considerations that are normally apart of these friendlies and teams will just be looking for a strong preparation plan that is logistically doable

[PrinceAli]

Would be nice to get a friendly with Portugal. Our reputation with Portugal should be pretty good with several of our players playing in Liga Nos and the fact that we proved to be a difficult challenge in 2018

They’re not qualified yet though and have a difficult match against Italy to get in

Poland would be nice too