Zendegifootball.com-Houston, Iran's national team is getting ready to participate in 2007 Asian Cup which is scheduled to begin on July 9th. This would be yet again another attempt by Iran to win the Asian Cup since the golden era of 70s when Iran ruled Asian football, and finished the Asian Cup with three consecutive championships.
With a quick review of Ghalenoei’s list of players and starters for the past 10 month, eight players seem to have their spot reserved for the starting line up, given they don't suffer any injury before then. These players are Rahman Rezaei, Mohammad Nosrati, Mehdi Mahdavi Kia, Andranik Teymourian, Javad Nekunam, Ali Karimi, Alireza Vahedi, and Vahid Hashemian. Six of these players are Europe-Based players, and the other two, Nosrati and Vahedi, are far more experienced and talented than their competitions in their spot to seal their starting role. All these players were also Branko's choices for World Cup with the exception of Vahedi that suffered from back injury just before World Cup.
The above list leaves three more spots open. The first spot is the goal keeping position. With veteran Ebrahim Mirzapour injured, Ghalenoei has had no choice but to seek among other options for the goal keeping, and therefore, to experiment with Hassan Roudbarian and Vahid Talebloo in the past few month. While neither one have had a clear cut performance above the other one, it is still up to Mirzapour himself if any of the two would get a chance to start for Iran. Mirzapour has recovered from the surgery on his knee but is yet to play for his club, Esteghlal Ahvaz. His conditioning is the main concern as he has been away for six month. If he doesn’t get ready till Asian Cup, the preparation camp as well as Iran's preparation matches would most likely determine the number one keeper for Iran.
The second spot is in defense. Ghalenoei has shown to be interested in classic 3-5-2 formation, with Vahedi playing in left side closer to the three back to form the pseudo four-men defense, or 3 1 in football terms. If Ghalenoei stays with such formation in defense, then Hossein Sadeghi or Hadi Aghili are his first two choices for the third defender to play next to Nosrati and Rezaei. Hadi Shakouri is the third possible candidate with outside chances to start. With Sadeghi being Ghalenoei's student in his club, and being more experienced with Team Melli under Branko as well as Ghalenoei, he has better chances to start for Iran. But Aghili's recent performances for his club, Sepahan, in ACL and IPL has increased his chances to become the starter as well.
Depending on the formation used, one more player can be added to the above three candidates. While 3-5-2 has been the formation of choice for the national team, Ghalenoei has used other formations during the past few month as well. One of such formations has been the 4-4-2 formation, with four defenders including Hossein Kaabi or Mahdavi Kia playing the right back position. If for any reason during the tournament, this formation becomes his choice again, then Kaabi would have the upper hand over Sadeghi or Aghili to start, as Nosrati and Rezaei’s spot in mid defense are sealed.
The third open spot is in forward position where Vahid Hashemian is yet to find an ideal complementary player to play next to him. During Branko's era, he was paired with Ali Daei that never seemed to work for him, as Daei was a similar player but much older version of Hashemian, and neither could play the role of a complimentary forward for the other one. During Ghalenoei's era, the mistake seems to be repeating itself as this time Reza Enayeti has become Hashemian's pair, rather unsuccessfully. Again both players are of similar style, of course with Hashemian being an international player and Enayati being far less gifted than Hashemian.
This vacant forward position will once again be the most critical choice for Iran's national team head coach. With Branko's strange persistence to use Daei at all times, Branko damaged his career as well as Daei's career among Iranian football fans. It is up to Ghalenoei to learn from such costly mistake, and look into better options to select the second forward.
One possible option that both coaches seem to have been missing for the past few years is Hossein Kaabi. Thanks to Mostafa Denizli's orthodox style, Kaabi seems to be rejuvenated under his new role as the right forward in Persepolis FC, and has found a new career for himself. Even Iran’s Olympic head coach, Vingo Begovich, has reconfirmed such option for Kaabi. In a recent do-or-die match for Iran's U23 team, Begoivich used Kaabi in forward position to bring the Olympic team back from death with a convincing 3-0 victory against Jordan in Amman. Without a doubt, Kaabi was one of the stars of that match. His amazing speed as well as his play making ability and his non-stop fighting spirit makes him a possible candidate for a more offensive position rather than the right back.
While Kaabi has been consistently producing in this short period of time as a forward, nevertheless, it might be too soon to judge if he is suitable for that position. More importantly, it is yet to be seen if his combination with Hashemian would work for the two and the national team. It would be up to Ghalenoei to test him in preparation stage, or use him as the surprising choice in Asian Cup.
Aside from the three open spots for the line up, one more spot that can cause trouble for Ghalenoei is the national team's trainer. It is clear that the days of classic football are over, and football world, including the giants of Asia, have moved to modern football that requires proper training to implement more sophisticated tactics. Such trainer is missing from Ghalenoei's long list of staff.
With a short time remaining till the beginning of the Asian Cup, and therefore not having enough time to bring an outsider to Iran to join the staff, it might be a good idea for Ghalenoei to look into addition of Theo De Jong to his staff. Since the addition of De Jong to Esteghal Tehran FC this IPL season, Esteghlal has been able to fill in the two digit gap with first place Saipa FC, and now is in second place to compete for championship. De Jong's role in such impressive turn around can not be denied as the stats speaks for itself.
De Jong's role in last year's Persepolis complete "face lift" was also clear. Within two month training under him, Persepolis FC changed from a boring traditional football team, which incidently was training under current national team’s trainer, Naser Ebrahimi, to a much better team that showed signs of modern football. De Jong's one year presence in Iran has allowed him to become more familiar with Iran’s complex football culture, and has made him a possible candidate to further help the national team with his training work. Holland's national team midfielder during 70s, De Jong, was also part of the coaching team that qualified Trinidad to 2006 World Cup.
Theo De Jong or else, Ghalenoei should look into an international trainer for the national team. Asian Power house teams such as Japan and Australia would not display the low quality of the qualifying round that he barely survived. At one point during the qualifying round, Iran was facing possible elimination by Asian third-tier Syria. During Asian Cup however, Asian giants will present a much tougher challenge tactically, and therefore, more sophisticated training plans is in order for him.
In second part, we will have a closer look at Iran's opponents in group stage, their preparation as well as Iran's preparation plans for the Asian Cup.
