Team Melli head coach, Dragan Skočić, dropped 5 Esteghlal players from the national team training camp today. According to press reports, Skocic removed the names of 5 players after their “no show” for training. Hamid Estili, the manager of the national football team, told ISNA: “These players were supposed to introduce themselves to the national team camp at 5 pm yesterday (Monday) and then get a release to go to the Esteghlal’s camp with the permission of the head coach, but they did not do so. They neither turned up nor informed us. They went directly to their club’s camp.”
The Esteghlal players are : Aref Gholami, Seyed Hossein Hosseini, Mehdi Mehdipour, Amir Hossein Hosseinzadeh and Saleh Hardani. It is not clear if this move by Skocic is a long term one, but it seems that these player’s chances of making it to the trip to Latin America are quite slim, but more importantly, it will be even a slimmer chance of anyone of them making the final list to the World Cup unless a strong reason is provided by Farhad Majidi, the team’s head coach and the Esteghlal management.
Esteghlal has won this seasons League title undefeated. They received the trophy yesterday after the match against Naft Masjed Soleiman.
UPDATE
In the latest development, Esteghlal club swiftly reacted to the dropping of the players by issuing an official apology!
The statement read: “Following the recent events which resulted in the expulsion of Esteghlal players selected for Team Melli training camps, we would like to inform the general public that the club has always acted in good faith in interacting with the national football team of the Islamic Republic of Iran, and considers itself obligatory to help the country’s representatives. In the recent case, unfortunately, despite the previous announcement of Team Melli’s head coach on the importance of the attendance of all players from the first day of the camp, there were discrepancies (..) in the planning of last week’s league matches, which caused negligence of our part. The team Melli leader issued a disciplinary action. Esteghlal Club is aware of its role in this incident and accepts its responsibility.
Therefore, while supporting and apologizing to Mr. Skocic for interrupting the national team training camp, we ask him to reinstate the 5 dropped Esteghlal players to the camp. Attending the camp and wearing the national team’s sacred shirt is the pride of Esteghlal Club. The club management supports and wishes Mr. Skocic and the Iranian national team all the success in their quest for the World Cup in Qatar, emphasizing our backing for the national team.”