Iran will either enjoy great success and advance (and more) or will have a humiliating World Cup. Given all that Iran's team and players are being put through by those who want to see it fail miserably, I see no in-between options. Incidentally, Mehdi Taremi made the following predictions about Iran's Group B results: England 1 Iran 1 Wales 0 Iran 1 Iran 2 USA 0
Yes, I agree. In my predictions "I played it safe" and gave them four points while still not picking them to advance. I didn't want to look a like a fool if I had predicted them to place rock bottom with 0 points and they would have proved me otherwise.
I dont see usa beating iran in this part of the world. At most usa will tie iran. Its simple respect and political awareness.
Usa will play to win. Iran will be fighting for something more that just winning. So i give iran the edge
Pretty ordinary start for AFC teams. Two more up tonight and neither is expected to get anything from their games.
But you know sport is not like this. France has injury worries. Australia has their chance to stay close to them
It's amazing the variability of score line in this sport. Saudi vs Argentina was a repeat of the Iran England match in terms of stats such as possession and chances created, yet one ends 6-2 with England converting 95% of their chances, and the other ends with Saudi have 2 chances 2 goals and Argentina missing all their chances with a bunch of offside goals. Although Saudi is a traditional rival to Iran this is good for AFC overall, congrats to Saudi. Hopefully Iran will bounce back against Wales and USA and Japan/Korea/Australia put in decent performances.
Saudi play a very risky highline. 3 offside goals, one of them is very questionable. If Arg led 2-0 then it would be similiar to Iran game vs England. Australia play well first but France are way out of their league. Japan today, i have high expection.
In the first half, the Saudis used the high press/offside trap almost to perfection in lieu of defending in numbers. All the offside goals were offside but one was very close. The strategy was risky; there is no guarantee it will payoff; from my vantage point Di Maria in particular was often inattentive or lazy staying a bit behind the Saudi defense in many sequences that killed options for Argentina to split open the Saudi high press. But at the end credit where credit is due. The Saudis did very well while Iran (for largely understandable reasons, much of it having more to do with politics than football) did not, using a very different tactical approach than Saudi Arabia. Queiroz has never learned or understood how to teach his teams to defend using a high line and the offside trap to reduce the size of the pitch. Renard on the other hand qualified Morocco to WC18 without conceding a goal using that tactic.
Herve Renard outcoached Lionel Scaloni to simply put. I think Argentina did not prepare for such highly risky approach deployed by Renard by any mean. That was evident after three goals got called off for offside. The Argentine players started pressing panic button and became clueless. Without legit aerial threat that can keep the Saudi defense apart(i.e. Olivier Giroud), things got more difficult and complicated for Messi and co. Combined with willingness to fight until the end demonstrated by his players, Renard's excellent tactical deployment and adjustment paid off.
Well done Asia so far. Japan and saudi Arabia won. I think Iran could have got a much better result without the political and social unrest. Only Australia was a bit disappointing against France but Australia defeated the 5th of South America during the playoffs to prove the worth of Asian football. Lets see what South Korea can do
Iran had the misfortune to have a political context in the middle of the World Cup. I still see them 2nd in this group.