{"id":43463,"date":"2021-09-05T20:14:30","date_gmt":"2021-09-06T03:14:30","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.persianfootball.com\/news\/?p=43463"},"modified":"2021-09-05T20:21:47","modified_gmt":"2021-09-06T03:21:47","slug":"2022-asian-qualifiers-iraq-vs-iran-preview","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.persianfootball.com\/news\/2021\/09\/05\/2022-asian-qualifiers-iraq-vs-iran-preview\/","title":{"rendered":"2022 Asian Qualifiers: Iraq vs. Iran [Preview]"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Sportsmole – DOHA, Iraq, and Iran will square off in an important clash on Tuesday, as they meet in the third round of the Asian World Cup Qualifiers.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Both nations progressed through Group B in the second round of the Qualifiers, with each team taking a victory over the opponents in that group.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Iraq had an impressive display in the second round of Asian World Cup Qualifiers, beginning in 2019 with a draw against Bahrain, followed by consecutive victories over Hong Kong, Cambodia, and Iran.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In the latter, Alaa Abbas netted a 92nd-minute winner to see the Lions of Mesopotamia take all three points from their rivals after Mohanad Ali had given them an initial lead.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

They would then hold on to the top spot thanks to wins over Cambodia and Hong Kong, with a defeat to Iran in the final game not enough to see them fall to second spot.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Dick Advocaat’s side began the third round with a trip to South Korea, and they earned a commendable point after a goalless draw.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

They will now look to put their first three-point haul on the board to strengthen their position in Group A with a spot in next year’s tournament on the line.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

They take on an Iran side who come in on the back of an opening victory, after closing out the second round with a win over Tuesday’s opponents.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Team Melli began the second round in style, beating Hong Kong away from home and thrashing Cambodia 14-0 on home turf, their largest victory since 2000, as Karim Ansarifard hit four goals alongside a Sardar Azmoun hat-trick, braces from Mehdi Taremi and Mohammad Mohebi and goals from Ahmad Nourollahi, Hossein Kanaanizadegan, and Mehrdad Mohammadi.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

They then suffered back-to-back defeats at the hands of Bahrain and Iraq, before bouncing back in style with wins over Hong Kong and Bahrain and a 10-0 thrashing of Cambodia.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

While it did not seal the top spot in the group, Dragan Skokic’s men capped off the second round with a hard-fought 1-0 win over Tuesday’s opponents, as Sardar Azmoun netted the only goal of the game to see Iran gain revenge on their rivals and qualify in second place.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Team Melli then began the third round with their fifth straight win in the Qualifiers, as Alireza Jahanbakhsh fired them to a 1-0 home victory over Syria, and Skokic will be hopeful of his side making it two wins from two when they face Iraq for the third time in the campaign.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Iraq battled hard to keep a clean sheet in South Korea, meaning Dick Advocaat should avoid making wholesale changes to his side.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The back four of Sherko Gubari, Ahmad Ibrahim, Ali Faez, and Ali Adnan should remain untouched, shielding Fahad Talib between the sticks.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Young forward Mohanad Ali will be hoping for a starting spot, having hit an impressive tally of 17 goals in 36 appearances for his nation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Iran boasts plenty of attacking talent, with Feyenoord attacker Alireza Jahanbakhsh set to keep his place after a goal last time out, while Brentford forward Saman Ghoddos also offers a threat in the final third.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The line will be led by Porto star Mehdi Taremi, who has 24 international goals to his name from 51 caps.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

At the other end of the pitch, Hossein Kanaanizadegan and Shojae Khalilzadeh should again parter up at the heart of a back four after a strong showing in the 1-0 win over Syria.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Iraq possible starting lineup:<\/strong>
Talib; Gubari, Ibrahim, Faez, Adnan; Attwan, Al-Ammari; Majid, Rasan, Bayesh; Ali<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Iran possible starting lineup:<\/strong>
Beiranvand; Salmani, Kanaanizadegan, Khalilzadeh, Amiri; Nourollahi, Sarlak; Gholizadeh, Ghoddos, Jahanbakhsh; Taremi.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Sportsmole Result:<\/strong> Iraq 0-1 Iran<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In a game between two sides renowned for being strong at the back, this could certainly come down to one goal splitting the nations, as it did in both second-round meetings.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

While they do not have the benefit of home advantage, we still see Iran having enough attacking power to get over the line against a resolute outfit.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Sportsmole – DOHA, Iraq, and Iran will square off in an important clash on Tuesday, as they meet…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":26307,"featured_media":43471,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[90,84,92,86,110],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-43463","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-c17-asian-competitions","category-c47-featured-news","category-c21-international-football-news","category-c13-team-melli-news","category-world-cup"],"views":1864,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.persianfootball.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/43463","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.persianfootball.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.persianfootball.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.persianfootball.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/26307"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.persianfootball.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=43463"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"http:\/\/www.persianfootball.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/43463\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":43472,"href":"http:\/\/www.persianfootball.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/43463\/revisions\/43472"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.persianfootball.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/43471"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.persianfootball.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=43463"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.persianfootball.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=43463"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.persianfootball.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=43463"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}