Tag: Asian Football Confederation

List of Iran U20 squad for Asian Cup is announced.

The coaching staff of the Iran’S U20 football team short-listed the names of 23 players as the official squad for the AFC U-20 Cup in Shenzhen, China, after reviewing the status of the players present in the camp.

The 2025 AFC U-20 Asian Cup will be the 42nd edition of the AFC U-20 Asian Cup (including previous editions of the AFC Youth Championship and AFC U-19 Championship), the biennial international youth football championship organised by the Asian Football Confederation (AFC) for the men’s under-20 national teams of Asia.

Uzbekistan are the title holders, having won the title in 2023.

The Iran U20 team will play in Group C of the AFC U-20 Cup with Indonesia, Yemen and defending champion Uzbekistan. The schedule of the Iranian team’s matches is as follows:

SQUAD LIST

The names of the players of the Iranian youth football team are as follows: Arsha Shakuri, Mohammad Gandomi, Armin Abbasi, Alireza Homaeifard, Hessam Nafri, Erfan Darvish Ali, Ali Hassani, Nima Andarz, Sina Moazami Tabar, Yaqoub Barajeh, Mohammad Dindar, Samir Habobati, Abolfazl Zamani, Abolfazl Zolaikhaei, Mobin Dehghan, Mahan Sadeghi, Amir Mohammad Razaghinia, Pouria Shahrabadi, Esmaeil Gholizadeh, Yousef Mazra, Abbas Kahrizi, Abolfazl Mordi and Reza Ghandipour.

Competition Schedule Group C


Thursday, February 13, 2025

GROUP STAGE – Group C

UZBEKISTAN vs YEMEN SHENZHEN YOUTH FOOTBALL TRAINING BASE PITCH 1 (SHENZHEN)

IRAN vs INDONESIA SHENZHEN YOUTH FOOTBALL TRAINING BASE CENTRE STADIUM  (SHENZHEN)

Sunday, February 16, 2025

YEMEN vs IRAN SHENZHEN YOUTH FOOTBALL TRAINING BASE PITCH 1 (SHENZHEN)

INDONESIA vs UZBEKISTAN YOUTH FOOTBALL TRAINING BASE CENTRE STADIUM  (SHENZHEN)

Wednesday, February 19, 2025

UZBEKISTAN vs IRAN SHENZHEN YOUTH FOOTBALL TRAINING BASE PITCH 1 (SHENZHEN)

INDONESIA vs YEMEN YOUTH FOOTBALL TRAINING BASE CENTRE STADIUM (SHENZHEN)

World Cup qualifiers: Iranians query decision to host matches in Bahrain

Iran head coach Dragan Skocic and Mehdi Taremi, one of the nation’s highest-profile players, have questioned the decision to hold the country’s World Cup qualifiers in Bahrain when play resumes in June.

The Iranians were informed by the Asian Football Confederation last week that the Gulf state will host the remaining matches in group C of the second round of the competition, which also features Iraq, Cambodia, and Hong Kong.

“I am wondering when these biased AFC decisions against Iranian football will come to an end,” the striker posted on Twitter.

“Bahrain’s heat and a whole host of other reasons are making me wonder, why there? I am still thinking about why these decisions do not come to an end. We have suffered our whole lives, this is just another one.”

Head coach Skocic, appointed in February 2020 to replace Marc Wilmots, also took to social media to query the decision, saying it was not made in the best interests of all the participants.

“In the session which was held to talk about the postponement of the matches, Bahrain’s representative, without any introduction, talked about hosting the remaining matches and it was the thing that surprised me the most,” the Croatian wrote in a post on Instagram.

“In my opinion, the AFC should have found a solution that equally benefits everyone – not one team – and made a decision according to the spirit of sport.

“But in the end, all the teams have to face us and we will undoubtedly have a strong presence and surpass this situation.”

The AFC did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

 Iraq leads the standings with Bahrain in second, while Iran, which has qualified for the last two World Cups, is in third, five points behind the leader with a game in hand.

Only the group winners of each of the eight groups in the second round of Asian qualifying are guaranteed to advance to the next phase of the competition.

Matches are due to be played from May 31 until June 15 after the COVID-19 pandemic saw all of Asia’s World Cup qualifiers postponed during 2020.