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He was one of the natural and gifted players with excellent goal-scoring abilities. He came from Karbala. In the 1970s, Saddam twice expelled Iranian Shiites from Iraq and drove them to their homeland. Stars like Kamel Anjini, who played for Tractor and TehranJavan in the Takhte Jamshid League and was selected for Team Melli in the late seventies, or Nouri Khodayari, were among those expelled.
Kamel Anjini didn't speak Farsi while growing up in Iraq and in the early days in Tehran, he always had to have an Arab friend by his side to take on his interpreter duties.
Anjini was playing for the Afsar club when the great Parviz Dehdari spotted him during a friendly match between Homa and Afsar. Dehdari liked what he saw of young Anjini, and invited Anjini to join Homa. However, the Afsar coach discouraged Kamel and prevented his move to Homa. That led to a despondent young talent and he kept away from football for three years.
On his return to playing, Anjini joined Tehran Javan, and after some excellent performances in the Tehran Clubs Cup, another great coach Hossein Fekri, then the head coach of TractorSazi, invited him to the Tabrizi team. Kamel, who played in the central defense position, suddenly shifted from this position to the forward area and never looked back.
One of his most memorable matches was the famous game between Tractor and Persepolis on July 15, 1978, which ended 1-1, Kamel scored the only goal of Tractor. In the Tehran Clubs Cup, he scored 6 goals in a single game with the Tehran Javan jersey against a powerful Vahdat team that had players in the caliber of Majid Jalali and Mehdi Abtahi. Vahdat had just defeated the great Persepolis of Ali Parvin and co earlier 2-1.
Kamel was invited to the Tehran Select team and then Team Melli where he was a member of the squad for the Asian Games in Delhi. One of the most important games was his presence in that famous match between Iran (selected by Tehran) and Bangladesh in the Qaed Azam Cup, which ended 9-0 in favor of Iran.
In those days, the only club and the only coach that played non-Persian and non-Shiite minorities and minorities were the TehranJavan and Hossein Fekri teams.
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Club:
Tehran Javan
D.O.B:
07-May-54
Born:
Karbala, Iraq
Height:
x cm
Weight:
x Kg
International Debut:
Pakistan 16-Feb-82
Position:
Forward
Age:
70
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