Dealings on the Path to Baharestan and Seoul
It’s unfair for him to be attacked in this manner. Today, he is considered Iran’s football representative in the Asian Football Confederation and a pride of the country’s football on international platforms. These were the remarks made some time ago by Mehdi Farvardin, head of the Parliament’s Sports Faction, who, amid attacks on Taj, asked his colleagues not to engage in specialized football discussions, the same expertise that was mentioned in some national team players’ Instagram stories on Friday.
National Team Players’ Protest
The story goes that on Friday afternoon, a group of veteran players from Iran’s national football team jointly posted a story on their personal Instagram pages. In it, they initially addressed two members of the Islamic Consultative Assembly, asking them not to interfere in football and to let footballers themselves make decisions for this sport. They further requested the members of the Football Federation Assembly to be careful in their choices to preserve the national team’s reputation in the World Cup and restore the lost credibility of the federation.
Parliament Members’ Interference in Football
Ehsan Hajsafi, Karim Ansarifard, and Alireza Jahanbakhsh, the first to third captains of the national team, along with other players like Mehdi Taremi, Saeid Ezatolahi, Seyed Majid Hosseini, and Sardar Azmoun, were the ones who posted this story. The two parliament members referred to were Mr. Qazizadeh Hashemi and Nasrollah Pejmanfar, who are staunchly standing by the disqualification of Mehdi Taj. However, the main issue is that the support of the head of the Sports Faction for Taj and the players’ harsh stories against two revolutionary parliament members are due to promises Taj has made to the Sports Faction and some of its members.
Taj, Skocic’s Nightmare
A well-informed source told Irangate that as soon as Taj is elected as the head of the Sports Federation, he will dismiss Skocic because many national team players do not accept him. Nonetheless, the presidency of this headline-making federation will be decided on September 8, and this very month is also the last opportunity to announce the final head coach of the teams to FIFA. A sensitive month where we must wait and see whether Skocic will be dismissed or promoted to a higher class.