Team Melli repeated the result of last match against tiny Pacific island of Guam in the Group D match today at the Guam FA field. The final score of 6-0 was the same score as the one in Tehran when the two teams last met.
Coached by Englishman Gary White, Guam have put the rugby-score losses of the past behind them with some giant-killing performances and were determined to preserve a remarkable unbeaten home record and to extend it againt Asia’s no 1 team.
Guam’s population is just 170,000 but White’s “Matao” have consistently punched above their weight, with victories against Turkmenistan and India, a country of 1.2 billion. However , all hopes of matching the top team of Asia or at least scoring a goal against Iran was soon dashed when Mehdi Taremi scored in the 12th minutes of the match played on Artificial turf. Some brilliant footwork by Mehdi Torabi outside the box followed by an immaculate pass to Taremi who buried the ball into the net , to open the floodgate.
Kamal Kamyabinia then added another for Iran with Torabi once gain playing the orchestrating role on the half an hour mark. Soon after , the energetic midfielder suffered some pain and was immediately substituted by Queiroz who replaced him with Masoud Shojaei at the end of the first half which ended 2-0 for Iran.
The second half started with blitz of offensive moves by Team Melli whose players did not have any major problems playing the artificial turf.
Ramin Rezaeian scored the first of 3 quick goals in matters of minutes. On the 49th minute , he open his credit with Team Melli with a good goal. A minute later , Taremi escaped his marker and beat J. Matkin . The Guam defender fouled him from behind. Referee blew for a penalty and was raised the red card for Matkinas a result of denying a scoring opportunity.
Masoud Shojaei dispatched the penalty with ease on minute 51.
4 – 0 for Iran with 2 quick goal.
With 10 players , Guam had a mammoth task in damage limitation. Soon after the sending off, Karim Ansarifard scored the 5th for Team Melli and Finally Taremi added a second to his credit and Iran’s 6th goal on 63rd minute.
Then a completely uncalled foul by the erratic Biranvand in Iran goal who handled the ball outside his box while two Iranian defenders were covering behind him. That resulted in a red card for the Team Melli keeper. The Naft Tehran keeper remained on the ground for minutes after that faking injury while the only pain inflicted was his pride and his profligacy for such amateurish play . Ezatollah Pourgaz took over the goalkeeping role as Iran has already substituted 3 players.
Apart from the act by Biranvand, and goal keeping in general in Team Melli, something that Queiroz has already been warned repeatedly against, the rest of team played quite well despite the low experience. Admittedly , Guam is not a team that Iran can measure its strength against , however , the smooth exchanges between the new players, the calm defending , the ball distribution and much more , were quite a good omen for this team. Lack of experience was evident in some moves, but this is expected for a team with players that have low international exposure and experience.
Iran with 14 points is now solidly at the top of the table in Group D and qualified for the Asian Cup 2018 in UAE . The two home games against Oman and India in 2016 will only solidify Team Melli’s position and prepare the team for the next round of the FIFA World Cup 2018 qualifiers.
| TEAMS | MP | W | D | L | GF | GA | +/- | Pts |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
 IRAN |
6 | 4 | 2 | 0 | 20 | 3 | 17 | 14 |
 OMAN |
5 | 3 | 2 | 0 | 9 | 3 | 6 | 11 |
 TURKMENISTAN |
6 | 2 | 1 | 3 | 6 | 9 | -3 | 7 |
 GUAM |
7 | 2 | 1 | 4 | 3 | 15 | -12 | 7 |
 INDIA |
6 | 1 | 0 | 5 | 4 | 12 | -8 | 3 |