Persian Gulf Pro League footballers to experience Asia Cup quarterfinals

Persianfootball.com – SYDNEY, Since 2004 many footballers from Iran’s top flight competition experienced quarterfinals of the AFC Asian Cup playing for Iran and Iraq. This year there are a total of 14 IPL players from Iran and Uzbekistan with a chance of experiencing quarterfinals, as Uzbekistan face Korea Republic in Melbourne tommorrow and Iran take on Iraq the following day in Canberra.

Clubs from 5 out of 7 most populated cities have representation apart from Karaj and Shiraz. Uzbekistan’s Bahodir Nasimov is the sole non-Iranian footballer. However there could have been two more non-Iranians, Iraqi Karar Jassim playing for Esteghlal Tehran was surprisingly not selected for Iraq national team, while his countryman Ala Abdul Zahra was released by Tractor Sazi Tabriz in December.

Four years ago in Qatar, a total of 21 players in Iran and 3 in Iraq were selected from clubs in Iran Pro League.
The three Iraqi were midfielders Hawar Mulla Mohammed (Esteghlal Tehran), Karrar Jassim (Tractor Sazi Tabriz) andstriker Emad Mohammed (Shahin Bushehr).

2007 AFC Asian Cup Champions Iraq squad had 3 players from IPL in possession being goalkeeper Noor Sabri and defender Khaldoun Ibrahim (both from Mes Kerman), striker Luay Salah(Persepolis Tehran). Team Melli that year had only 11.

2004 in China, Iraq had midfielder Abdul-Wahab Abu Al-Hail (Esteghlal Ahvaz) and Iran had 20 from the country’s domestic league.

Persian Gulf Pro League was founded in 2001 and to date footballers from 60 nationalities have played in the competition.

List of players from Iran Pro League at the 2015 AFC Asian Cup:

Esteghlal (TEHRAN) – Mohsen Forouzan (GK), Khosro Heydari (DF), Amir Hossein Sadeghi (DF), Omid Ebrahimi (MF)
Foolad (AHVAZ) – Soroush Rafiei (MF)
Naft (TEHRAN) – Alireza Beiranvand (GK), Morteza Pouraliganji (DF), Vahid Amiri (FW)
Padideh (MASHHAD) – Bahodir Nasimov (FW) “UZBEKISTAN”
Persepolis (TEHRAN) – Mohammad Reza Khanzadeh (DF)
Rah Ahan (SHAHR-E REY) – Ramin Rezaeian (DF)
Sepahan (ESFEHAN) – Ehsan Hajsafi (MF), Vouria Ghafouri (DF)
Tractor Sazi (TABRIZ) – Andranik Teymourian (MF)