Iranian Veteran Journalists Association Letters to AFC about ACL match venues

Letter 1:

Tuesday, 6th February 2018

Dato’ Windsor John
General Secretary
Asian Football Confederation
AFC House
Jalan 1/155B, Bukit Jalil
57000 Kuala Lumpur
Malaysia

windsor.john@the-afc.com
media@the-afc.com

Dato’ John,

We, members of Iran’s Veteran Sports Journalists, are writing our second letter in three days to pose questions to the Asian Football Confederation for which we hope you have convincing answers for the sake of transparency.

Iran’s most popular football television program – 90 – conducted a live poll last night. The question posed to their viewers was:

Has the Iranian Football Federation done all the right things to resolve the Iranian clubs’ hosting issue of Saudi Clubs?

Predictably 89.8% (1,410,893 viewers) said NO and only 10.2% (159,802 viewers) said YES their efforts had been adequate enough.

We must admit that the majority of our colleagues were amongst the decidedly despondent Iranian football family who blame our own football federation for the current impasse, until we discovered the real facts earlier this morning.

We have come to assemble the latest sequence of events that has led to Iranian clubs being ordered by your office to play their so-called home games in Oman.

In our previous letter, we referred to our federation’s contacts with our neighbouring countries and their silence or rejection of their request for various reasons, including Oman’s non-responsiveness to two of our federation’s written and documented requests in January for Tractorsazi’s home game against Al Ahli.

It seems with the 2018 AFC Champions League fast approaching, our federation sent a letter to your office on 29th January advising you that they had yet to find a resolution for the home games of Tractorsazi and Estghlal on 12th and 20th February.

Evidently, that letter was sent to your office while the federation had been in discussion with Qatar Football Association.

Those discussions came to a quick resolution on the same day, 29th January 2018, shortly after they had sent your office, the letter referred to above.

The QFA’s acceptance prompted the Iranian Football Federation to send another letter the following day, 30th January 2018, advising you that Iranian clubs would play host to Saudi clubs in Doha on 12th and 20th February.

QFA, too, had copied AFC when responding affirmatively to our federation’s request.

Two days after receiving the two abovementioned, dated 30th January letters, you seem to have sent a response to Iran federation’s letter of 29th January while making no reference to the subsequent letter of 30th January. That letter of yours, dated 1st February 2018 did not even acknowledge the receipt of their 30th January letter.

A day later and on Friday, 2nd February 2018, you sent a letter to Iran telling our federation that they must play in Oman, again referring to their letter of 29th January and no acknowledgement of the 30th January letter.

You have repeatedly chosen to ignore the advisory letter sent to your office on 30th January confirming that Iran had come to an agreement with Qatar Football Association to host Saudi clubs.

We are posing a simple questions to your office:

“Can you please confirm the receipt of the Iranian Football Federation’s letter sent to your office on 30th January? Why you have made no reference to that important letter in subsequent communiqués you have had with our federation?”

Your two initial reactions to Iranian federation’s letters were both sent after 30th January, precisely on 1st and 2nd February.

We have not seen the content of your letters, but the sheer fact that important advisory letters by Iran and Qatar to your office are ignored lead us to feel “Puzzled, Shocked and Dismayed in that order”.

Puzzled as Iran never received any response from the Oman FA with regards to their initial 11th January request of having Tractorsazi’s 12th February AFC Champions League match against Al Ahli of Saudi Arabia, despite a follow-up documented and written request on 24th January.

Shocked as Esteghlal never asked for their match to be staged in Oman. Moreover, while the Iranian football federation had asked Oman FA for their assistance with only Tractorsazi’s match and their non-response, AFC claims that Oman FA had submitted their acceptance of staging both games to them, presumably after Iran had advised you of nomination of Qatar as the venue for both games. Had this not been the case, you should have told Iran prior to 29th January that Oman FA had sent their acceptance of hosting BOTH Iranian clubs.

Why should the AFC have received their response to our federation’s query in the first place?

Dismayed as anyone with one iota of intelligence realises that this decision was made behind the back of our federation and clubs, AFTER Iran announced their nomination of Qatar as their home venue. We feel the AFC has sided with Saudi clubs in this matter against the spirit of fair play.

The AFC have made a political decision in favour of one AFC Member Association over another, both equally important Member Associations and both equally passionate about the game. Iran and Oman have had great relations since the 1970’s and your forcing of Oman to act in this manner are damaging that friendship as football matters so much to our nation.

How can we turn to our disillusioned younger media colleagues and millions of our ardent fans trying to convince them that we have a level playing field in Asia?

Saudi clubs have been given a chance to nominate their home venues as Al Ain (UAE) and Kuwait for the group stage of the 2018 AFC Champions League season. We expect to be given the same chance, now that we are denied to stage these two matches at home yet again and much to the chagrin of millions of our fans.

The tweet issued by a Saudi national and former member of the AFC Media Committee, Sa’ad Al Harthi, confirms all of our suspicions. In his tweet (@S_alshdadi) of Saturday, 3rd February (10:21 p.m. Local Time) he warns that this clearly one-sided decision in favour of their clubs would come back to haunt them.

He goes on to say that this proves AFC had sided with Saudi Arabia and therefore, Iran can use this to eventually take the matter higher up forcing us to play against them on a home-and-away basis very soon. This comes from a Saudi national, whose safety we fear now for simply stating the obvious.

It is abundantly clear that Iranian clubs and federation had no say in finding a satisfying resolution in this mater. You are forcing them to play at a venue that is logistically more favourable to their Saudi opponents.

If forced to play in Oman, our clubs would play their so-called “home” matches before thousands of “Away” fans and a sparse hundred or so local Iranian residents of Muscat. The Oman visa process for Iranian nationals is lengthy, expensive and simply prohibitive for any large travelling party to attend such games.

“Bringing Asia Together”, slogan selected by the Local Organising Committee of the 2019 AFC Asian Cup in the U.A.E., sounds hollow.

The Emiratis themselves are the very first ones to “Tear Asia Apart” when UAE’s Under-16 team did not travel to Doha last September to participate in the group stage of the AFC Under-16 tournament without any explanation as to why they did not participate.

Two Saudi and Emirati members of the AFC Competitions Committee did not participate in their respective committee meeting in Doha in July 2017, again without any advance, plausible and written notice. The same two members were present in the next meetings in Tokyo.

If only an adequate query process had sought to obtain a formal explanation from the Saudi and Emirati football officials’ on those lesser profile cases, the AFC would not have had to deal with their unreasonable demands starting from switching their home-and-away games against Qatari clubs to neutral venues too. You would certainly not be in this predicament now.

We hope if any query is conducted, young football players in the United Arab Emirates will not be punished for the political stance of their rules and their interference in the game we all love so dearly across Asia.

Our fans and indeed Saudi football fans are amongst the most passionate in Asia. They are denied witnessing this greatest of all Asian football rivalry for the actions of a small minority that took place in January 2016. Our government condemned those actions. The AFC ExCo’s decision of March 2016 was much to our chagrin, but our football family have respected and endured it up until now.

The Saudis lobbied hard to deny our clubs, fans and indeed theirs of this sporting spectacle. They have now gone one step further working behind the scenes forcing the AFC to even deny us nominating our host venue. This we CANNOT accept.

DPR Korea is under strict UN sanctions and in the middle of a crisis in East Asia with their neighbouring countries. To the best of our knowledge, their citizens are barred from travelling to Korea Republic and Japan.

Despite such harsh UN-imposed sanctions, the United Nations issued special dispensation – and indeed the government of Japan – to the DPR Korea Men’s national team to participate in the 2017 East Asian Football Federation championship between 9th and 16th December 2017 in Japan.

We will soon witness the joint participation of DPR Korea and Korea Republic athletes in the upcoming Winter Olympics, to be staged in PyeongChang, Korea Republic. Baby steps though they may seem in the big picture, these sporting exchanges can no doubt ease political tensions and eventually to a better world for all concerned.

Indeed, we learned today that a 22-strong high ranking government delegation from the DPR Korea will arrive in Korea Republic this coming Friday, on the opening day of the Winter Olympics. This is indeed a direct impact of the sporting exchanges between the two sides of the 38th parallel at the Korean peninsula.

FIFA is currently in the middle of staging four technical and refereeing seminars in Doha. The 2018 FIFA World Cup referees seminar will see referees from Iran, Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, UAE, Egypt and indeed Qatar working hand in hand with one another in no other place than Qatar this very week. We welcome such events, however small or insignificant they may seem.

Attached, you will see pictures of that seminar with Iranian referee Alireza Faghani and his Saudi colleague and brother Fahad Al Mirdasi sitting side by side at this all-important seminar in Doha of all places!

Do the right thing. Let our teams play in Doha. But, above all we absolutely would love to welcome our Saudi brothers to Tehran, Isfahan, Tabriz, Ahvaz, Shiraz and all corners of our ancient, vast and diverse land and in turn visit them in their country.

May Peace and Friendship prevail around the world.

Members of Iran’s Veteran Sports Journalists
Manoochehr Zandi (Chair)
Gholam-Hosseing Zaman Abadi (Secretary General)
Ardeshir Laroodi (Honourary Chair)
Jahangir Kosari, Shahram Vaziri, Khosrow Valizadeh, Ali Reiisi, Ahmad Mirzaiian, Mohammad Reza Mirzaiian, Majid Nadiri, Habibollah Jiroodi, Dariush Kavoosi, Toraj Laroodi, Jamshid Hamidi, Mohamad-Reza Mansoorian, Khosrow Kafili, Amir Yazdjerdi, Ali Shakeri

Fahad Al Mirdasi (Saudi Arabia) and Alireza Faghani (Iran) sitting side-by-side (front row right) at the 2018 FIFA World Cup Russia™ Seminar in Doha, Qatar (5th February 2018)

Letter 2:

Sunday, 4th February 2018

Dato’ Windsor John
General Secretary
Asian Football Confederation
AFC House
Jalan 1/155B, Bukit Jalil
57000 Kuala Lumpur
Malaysia

windsor.john@the-afc.com
media@the-afc.com

Dato’ John,

We, members of the Iranian Veteran Sports Journalists Association, are writing to express our disbelief with the latest development surrounding the status of the Asian Champions League matches concerning home-and-away matches between Iranian and Saudi clubs for the current 2018 season.

For the third consecutive season, matches between Iranian and Saudi clubs will have to be played on neutral venues. This is following the rise of political tension between Iran and Saudi Arabia in January 2016.

Please allow us, as law obeying citizens, to convey our condemnation of actions of a small minority who attacked the Saudi embassy in Tehran and its consulate in Mashhad in early January 2016. The deplorable actions of a few led the Asian Football Confederation to decide in March 2016 that all matches involving Saudi and Iranian sides to be staged on neutral territories.

However, we believe there should be an annual review of the AFC Executive Committee’s decision of March 2016 as changes in circumstances should be taken into consideration from one year to another.

We were hoping that our clubs could play host to their Saudi counterparts in this season of the AFC Champions League. However, for reason unknown to us, the AFC Executive Committee did not even entertain reviewing its decision of two years ago.

We read with huge disappointment that our clubs would have to play host to Saudi clubs at neutral venues yet again.

During the last two seasons, Saudi clubs nominated Qatar and U.A.E. as their home venue, while our clubs chose to play in Muscat, Oman, with devastating financial impact for our clubs.

Due to strict visa regulations, our fans were unable to travel to Muscat either, with the exception of a few hundred local residents fans of Iranian descent, Saudi clubs played before thousands of their own fans making a mockery of a “home advantage” for our clubs.

With that in mind, it was understandable that our clubs looked for alternative venues to reduce their financial losses and having more of a “home advantage” so far as spectator support was concerned for the 2018 season.

It is our understanding that our football federation had first contacted Oman Football Association on 11th January for Tractorsazi’s home match against Saudi Arabia’s Al Ahli to be played on 12th February. Having followed that initial request on 24th January, Oman FA never responded to Iran’s request.

Esteghlal, on the other hand, chose to look for an alternative venue amongst Central Asian countries. So far as we understand, Uzbekistan did not respond to Esteghlal’s request. Kyrgyzstan declined due to winter conditions in February and Turkmenistan’s artificial pitch was not acceptable to their coaching staff.

With no response from Oman and the ensuing deadline to nominate our hosts, the Iranian Football Federation turned to Qatar Football Association seeking their assistance. Qatar FA responded promptly accepting to host the two games on 12th and 20th February.

However, we have read reports with horror that the Asian Football Confederation has made a unilateral decision on behalf of our two clubs, Tractorsazi Tabriz and Esteghlal Tehran, forcing them to play their “home” matches in Muscat, Oman, in contrast to the AFC allowing Saudi Arabian clubs to “choose” their desired home venues in Kuwait and UAE for the return matches of the same fixtures.

Both Saudi and Iranian clubs nominated their home venues in the last two seasons as per the ruling of March 2016 when AFC decided that matches involving Iranian and Saudi clubs would be played on neutral territory. Consequently, the Asian Football Confederation asked both sides of the dispute to nominate their desired home venues. At no point in the last two seasons, did you force one side to play at any given location.

However, there seems to be one rule for the Saudi clubs and another for Iranian clubs in this upcoming AFC Champions League season. This is a clear violation of your own ruling and against the spirit of Fair Play.

Following Qatar’s acceptance of staging home matches of the two affected Iranian clubs, the Iranian football federation communicated that decision to you on 30th January. Instead of simply ratifying that decision, you seemed to have ignored that letter.

While Oman had not responded to Tractorsazi’s request, AFC decided to choose Muscat as the venue for both Tractorsazi and Esteghlal within less than 48 hours of receiving confirmation from our football federation that those two matches would be played in Qatar.

Can you please give us a clear explanation so that we are convinced that this astonishing decision of yours was not the outcome of quick conversations between yourself and officials from the football associations of Saudi Arabia and Oman on 30th and 31st January?

Anything else is simply fabrication of facts that took place behind the scenes and away from the domain of Iranian football officials, the rightful body who should have nominated their desired venue to you, which they indeed did on 30th January.

We have been told that Oman have not responded to Tractorsazi’s written request for their home game of 12th February even after your announcement. Esteghlal never sought to play in Muscat as previously stated earlier in this letter.

We read reports of Saudi football officials’ dismay of playing their away matches in Doha in various media outlets on 30th January, despite the Asian Football Confederation’s categorical decision to authorise Qatari clubs hosting Saudi Clubs in Doha and vice versa only a week earlier.

Those same Saudi media outlets and even official club social media channels in Saudi Arabia made your official announcement shortly after you had transmitted your decision to Tehran on Friday, which is a holiday in both Saudi Arabia and Iran.

It seems Saudi media and officials had advance knowledge of your decision, which indeed we believe they forced you to make. While the Iranian football officials only saw your official letter on Saturday, 3rd February (working day in Iran), their Saudi counterparts made official announcements a day earlier and shortly after Friday prayer in Saudi Arabia, on their holiday.

You have taken side in this dispute. Instead of using the power of football to help bridge the political gap to at least bring the football communities of Saudi Arabia and Iran closer together, you have widened that gap and inflamed the feelings of football fans against your organisation.

Members of Iran’s Veteran Sports Journalists have followed Asian football competitions since their infancy in the 1960s. Our football has been a great part of the Asian football sphere since those early years. The passion of our fans is unrivalled not only in Asia, but also across the whole world.

Those same fans in Iran feel disillusioned by the Asian Football Confederation and regard your organisation a biased one and against them. Will you do the right thing to act as a fair and neutral body to change those three-decade long lingering feelings?

Football is about players and fans. Administrators come and go, but fans will be there at the best of times and worst of times. And these seem to be the worse of times for Iranian fans vis-à-vis Asian Football Confederation’s treatment of their clubs.

“One Asia * One Goal” and “Bringing Asia Together” seem hollow slogans given AFC’s unfair treatment of our clubs. We respectfully ask you to put those slogans into practice and eradicate the disillusionment we all feel in Iran following this latest episode and unfair decision of yours.

You have allowed Saudi clubs to choose their venues while trying to force Iranian clubs to play at a venue chosen by you, and influenced by Saudi Arabian football officials.

With the first of these two games due to take place on Monday, 12th February, you must respect your own decision of March 2016 whereby you ordered matches involving Saudi and Iranian clubs to be played on neutral territories, to be nominated by both sides and not chosen by the Asian Football Confederation.

You have been entrusted with the running of Asian football across a vast and culturally diverse continent. Politics separates us across our continent while football is one social phenomenon that acts as a unifying force for more than half the world population within the AFC territory.

Please keep politics out of our football to preserve it as the beautiful game we have loved all our lives. Not too much to ask, or is it? Prove us wrong by doing the right thing please.

Kind regards,

Members of Iran’s Veteran Sports Journalists
Manoochehr Zandi (Chair)
Gholam-Hosseing Zaman Abadi (Secretary General)
Ardeshir Laroodi (Honourary Chair)
Jahangir Kosari, Shahram Vaziri, Khosrow Valizadeh, Ali Reiisi, Ahmad Mirzaiian, Mohammad Reza Mirzaiian, Majid Nadiri, Habibollah Jiroodi, Dariush Kavoosi, Toraj Laroodi, Jamshid Hamidi, Mohamad-Reza Mansoorian, Khosrow Kafili, Amir Yazdjerdi, Ali Shakeri