Tag: Tractorsazi Tabriz

FFIRI files a countersuit against Marc Wilmots.

Mehr news agency reports that the Iranian Football Federation FFIRI, has filed a countersuit against the lawsuit by Marc Wilmots claiming over a million dollars.  The lawyer assigned by the FFIRI is the same Swiss lawyer who failed in his most recent case while representing the TractorSazi Tabriz football club.

In that case, an infamous Irish player by the name of Anthony Stokes has won a libel case worth US$ 400,000 that Tractorsazi has to pay the Irishman plus 5% interest.

The Former Republic of Ireland international Anthony Stokes has reportedly been arrested by armed police at London’s Gatwick Airport due to an outstanding warrant for his arrest last week.

Stokes arrived at the airport on a plane from Dubai, where he had been on a short break, after refusing to return back to his current employer Persepolis!

In Wilmots vs FFIRI, the Belgian coach is claiming several million euros in back payment plus interest. It is quite likely that Wilmots will win the case and Iranian football will have to pay yet another hefty sum to outsiders due to their own utter incompetence and mismanagement of the federation.

The next in line to pay similar fines are Persepolis and Esteghlal who have several open cases against them in Zurich all for breach of contract and non-payment of dues.

The irony is that all such funds have to come from the public coffers as these clubs are practically bankrupt and wholly dependent on the ministry of Sports budget.

 

 

Amir Hossein Peyrovani added to Omid coaching team.

Amir Hossein Peyrovani has been appointed as Omid team coach under Hamid Estili.

The 50 years old former Bargh Shiraz player who comes from a well-known footballing family has previously coached Iran’s U 20 for two years and Omid Team from 2017 to 2018 with limited success. He faced a lot of criticism while at the helm of Omid team with some describing him as being out of depth.

He was operating as Assistant Coach to Mustafa Denizli in Tractorsazi Tabriz before his appointment to Omid Team.

Omid team is competing in the AFC Asian U23 Championship in Thailand in January 2020. The 3 top teams of that tournament will also qualify for the 2020 Tokyo Olympic games football competition.  Iran is in the most difficult group of the championship and experts do not consider their chances of qualification from the group as high.

Analyzing Wilmots’ selection.

Marc Wilmots started his first official match with Team Melli in the FIFA World Cup 2022 qualifiers with a 2-0 win away to Hong Kong, is determined to build his own team rather than rely on the previous one created by Queiroz.

Morteza Mansouri
Morteza Mansouri (Sepahan)

In an evolutionary move, the Belgian head coach of Iran’s national team made a few changes to his players’ list for the next two matches against Cambodia at home and away to Bahrain. Wilmots is determined to show that he plans to evaluate and pick new players. The new squad list indicates that the Belgian coach has a great deal of confidence in the domestic League players, unlike his predecessor.

Wilmots invited Mohammad Mohebbi (21 Years) and Morteza Mansouri (29 years), two key players for current league leader Sepahan, for the first time. Wilmots’ decision to continue including Siavash Yazdani and Mohammad Naderi’s in the squad is another proof that he has much confidence in the domestic league players.

Although neither Yazdani or Naderi played in the match against Hong Kong, however, they were preferred over the experienced but ageing Vouria Ghafouri of Esteghlal. The four new players along with the regular defence players Majid Hosseini, Morteza Pouraliganji, Hossein Kanan-Zadegan will significantly lower the overall average age of Team Melli squad

The most notable omission in the list, however, must be the exclusion of Alireza Jahanbakhsh, who has been a regular fixture in the national team’s camps for the past seven years. Jahanbakhsh has just recovered from a slight knee injury and was a non-utilized bench player in today’s 3-0 Brighton win against Tottenham Hotspurs in the English Premier League.

Jahanbakhsh has been having an unfortunate time since his move to Brighton at the beginning to last season. The record signing by Brighton failed to score a single goal in all competitions last season. With the change of the head coach, Jahanbakhsh failed to even make it on the bench for his club and has yet to feature in the Premier League this season. His performance with Team Melli in the AFC Asian Cup was far from brilliant either.

Wilmots has also created a serious competition in goal for the ever-present Alireza Biranvand. In contention for the number one spot in the goal are Payam Niazmand and Mohammad Rashid Mazaheri, who have both managed to keep a clean sheet record after six weeks of Persian Gulf Premier League competition matches.

Biranvand, despite some flashes of brilliance, with the penalty save from Cristiano Ronaldo is the top of his achievements, has many suspect moments and quite a questionable temperament. Many critics believe that Niazmand is a better goalkeeper but lacks the international experience of Beiranvand.

Persepolis with five players, Tractorsazi Tabriz with four and Sepahan Isfahan with three players have the highest number in the new list of Team Melli squad. Esteghlal also has only two players after Vouria Ghafouri and Seyyed Hossein Hosseini were crossed off the final list.

Team Melli will play against Cambodia on Thursday, October 10, in Tehran and then travel to Bahrain to play against their national team on October 15th.

Ando Teymourian joins Umm Salal.

The Captain of Team Melli Andranik ‘Ando’ Teymourian has joined Umm Salal in the Qatar league for a fee close to US$ 1.2 million.

Teymourian who was playing for Tractorsazi Tabriz team last season , has played in QSL before with Al Khraitiat club before returning to Iran and playing with Esteghlal.

Pejman Montazeri , who is the other Team Melli player in Umm Salal is certain to leave the team and join Al Ahli club to be the partner of Mojtaba Jabbari.

Teymourian will be back in Tehran after the signing of the contract , then will join his new team in the Holland preparation camp. Umm Salal ended last season in a respectable 6th position.