World Cup 2022 Qualifier: Korea Republic - Iran (Info, Updates & Live Reports)

[Ghermez Agha]

We have gone from a team with huge squad depth in the CQ era to people calling this a "B squad" because some regular starters were missing. This is laughable. If you really think the only problem with this game was that JB and Taremi were missing you still have not grasped how poor a coach Skocic is and what predicament we have been in for more than a year, a predicament conveniently masqueraded in wins against weak Asian teams. The only Asian team of any meaningful pedigree in our group we could not beat in two games.

Bingo! Post of the day

[Ari]

I don't understand.

Do we need another mistake similar to Wilmots??

Part of the job should be to control damages. Wilmots was a thief who stole from us. If we had money, we could sue him.

Keep Skocic. Only thieves will come to coach. Skocic cares and his salary is reasonable.

WHY cannot our members do cost-benefit analyses?

IR mentality. I see. As they always tried to teach us that a Khatami/ Rouhani is better then a Ahmadinejad/ Raisi? Same shit. We need higher standards. I really don't get it why we are always that koongoshad.

[Omid177]

This TM is just a bum version of the 2006 TM. Back then when players like Karimi and Mahdavikia got injured we immediately started panicing and now when Taremi is absent, we barely beat the likes of Lebanon. In 2006 we had at least several decent players who played in Europe. Now we only have Sardar and Mehdi and that's it. With CQ, we had our best player Dejagah injured many times and still performed very well.

[PSGman#19]

We have gone from a team with huge squad depth in the CQ era to people calling this a "B squad" because some regular starters were missing. This is laughable. If you really think the only problem with this game was that JB and Taremi were missing you still have not grasped how poor a coach Skocic is and what predicament we have been in for more than a year, a predicament conveniently masqueraded in wins against weak Asian teams. The only Asian team of any meaningful pedigree in our group we could not beat in two games.

Taremi and JB were the only starters missing? Breaking news!
What about Ezza, Moharammi, ghoddos, and even khalilzadeh injury?

[mahestan]

Taremi and JB were the only starters missing? Breaking news!
What about Ezza, Moharammi, ghoddos, and even khalilzadeh injury?

In addition to Karim Bagheri also being out with COVID, who I consider one of the biggest pieces in our coaching staff.

[Nokhodi]

This TM is just a bum version of the 2006 TM. Back then when players like Karimi and Mahdavikia got injured we immediately started panicing and now when Taremi is absent, we barely beat the likes of Lebanon. In 2006 we had at least several decent players who played in Europe. Now we only have Sardar and Mehdi and that's it. With CQ, we had our best player Dejagah injured many times and still performed very well.

Yes, and instead of focusing on training, cliques formed in TM. We lost sight of the bigger picture.

I can't stress this enough - physical conditioning and fitness is imperative regardless of what tactics you want to implement, and what players can do technically.

For some reason we think we're a WC 2nd round level team - ok, fair. That requires effort from everybody. At some point we will need our players to play their best consistently!

[DR Strangemoosh]

In addition to Karim Bagheri also being out with COVID, who I consider one of the biggest pieces in our coaching staff.

He seemed to be enjoying himself in Dubai, though...?

[Farzadfarhangni]

Guys, please. We have already qualified for WC and this kind of loss is not totally unexpected. We did the same thing in 2018 when we tied Syria 2-2 in Tehran after we had already qualified. I don't recall people asking for CQ's head, well, maybe a tiny minority.

We can see today why Skocic stuck with the same team and little to no experimentation up to day. Without long term camps and having the players in your possession for a sustained periods, it is hard to experiment with new players playing along players that just show up from Europe and have one jet lagged practice with the team before the game. But experimentation was forced upon him today given so many players missing.

I don't know why some coaches feel like they have to have an elderly, over the hill player in the team all the time. CQ with Masoud Shojai and Skocic with Hajsafi. In Skocic's defense, it looked like he was phasing Hajsafi out but I suppose he put Hajsafi in today because our usual captain, Jahanbakhsh, was not available and he had to choose between Ansarifard and Hajsafi. Still a poor decision. He could have given the armband to Amiri who deserves it more than anyone, excluding today's performance.

Our game plan was sound. To me, much much much more than Shoja's injury, what turned the game around was Abedzadeh's mistake. Had we gone into the locker room nil-nil, things could have turned out much differently.

I hate when our players argue with each other about a bad pass, etc... And I hate when they all rush to the referee... This is something that is in our culture but a good coach has the power to change.

[TM4LIFE]

People are vastly understating the value of players like Ezatollahi, ARJ, Ghoddos, and even Moharrami in breaking a press. Our team resorted to 'bekesh ziresh' because simply put our midfield and fullbacks did not have the quality, creativity, ball control, experience, and vision needed to break an aggressive press. Not only that, but the attacking chemistry completely changes. Taremi makes Azmoun so much more free and allows him to shine whereas the setup we had today... I mean amiri as a winger is an atrocity and that midfield combo made me want to gouge my eyes out

Listen, yeah it sucked and im sure some coaching alterations could've had this team playing better but all in all we went into it expecting a rough one and we got out without having embarrassed ourselves in a relatively meaningless game. If anything its a nice shakeup and reality check for the team and will help address weaknesses earlier.

[DR Strangemoosh]

If anything its a nice shakeup and reality check for the team and will help address weaknesses earlier.

I don't have faith that weaknesses will be addressed, because the team hasn't really progressed both in terms of playing on the pitch or in terms of building depth and sowing seeds for the future.

This team is good enough for a 2006 WC performance - one draw and two losses and a lot of frustration at the world cup currently...

[Philosophy_King]

I don't have faith that weaknesses will be addressed, because the team hasn't really progressed both in terms of playing on the pitch or in terms of building depth and sowing seeds for the future.

This team is good enough for a 2006 WC performance - one draw and two losses and a lot of frustration at the world cup currently...

I totally agree. Since there is no justifiable hope to make it to the next round, i just hope that we don't get destroyed 5-0 this time around. We could have lost much more badly than that today, no imagine performing like this against Teams like Brazil, France, Belgium etc...

[milad_b]

We have gone from a team with huge squad depth in the CQ era to people calling this a "B squad" because some regular starters were missing. This is laughable. If you really think the only problem with this game was that JB and Taremi were missing you still have not grasped how poor a coach Skocic is and what predicament we have been in for more than a year, a predicament conveniently masqueraded in wins against weak Asian teams. The only Asian team of any meaningful pedigree in our group we could not beat in two games.

As someone who is a huge die hard CQ fan, we did actually have problems against SK when he was our coach. Also we did lose similarly to Japan (with our A Team). I don't think the problem was the coach. Its the players that can't keep their sh*t together. Also Again hajsafi is the problem. How does he get invited and make the line up is a mystery for all of us.

The main problem is our MD. Saeed missing this game was a huge blow for us and I think Omid Ebrahimi should've been invited instead .

Things that totally ruined Skocic's plan:

1.)Shoja got injured. Go re watch the game again. We were playing some good football before his injury. He had Son controlled in that time. As soon he got injured and BAM son scored.
2.) Abedzadeh's blunder ! Thats some amatuer mistake
3.) Ehsan Haj safi!

4.) Hardani was not suitable for this match. He could not control SON. Son is very very physical and could've easily take him out. Same goes for suspended moharami.

[mehdi13]

There was no Taremi or Ezatolahi against Japan also.

[milad_b]

^^^ lol and hajsafi rid in that match too. similarly to today.

[I LOVE IRAN!]

I think people forget quickly that until a year ago we always struggled to beat the likes of Iraq, Syria, and Lebanon with the same players we have today.

one player makes a huge difference, let alone 4 main starters lol. Id prefer, if we lose, to lose against s.korea than the likes of Iraq or Syria.

you can't always win