{"id":12315,"date":"2011-07-23T17:36:24","date_gmt":"2011-07-24T00:36:24","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.persianfootball.com\/news\/2011\/07\/23\/iran-defeat-chanceless-maldives\/"},"modified":"2011-07-23T17:36:24","modified_gmt":"2011-07-24T00:36:24","slug":"iran-defeat-chanceless-maldives","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.persianfootball.com\/news\/2011\/07\/23\/iran-defeat-chanceless-maldives\/","title":{"rendered":"Iran defeat chanceless Maldives [VIDEO]"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"ansarifard\"PFDC – TEHRAN, Iran scored a comfortable 4-0 win over a helpless Maldives in the first leg of AFC World Cup qualification round 2, but could have scored another dozen had they been more concentrated in front of goal. <\/strong><\/p>\n

The Maldives held on to a good result with luck and permanent grass rolling and obviously will pose no threat in the return leg on in Male on Thursday. <\/p>\n

Iran, again starting in a 4-3-3 formation, took an early lead through Karim Ansarifard who tapped the ball in from close range after a Mohammad-Reza Khalatbari cross from the left. <\/p>\n

Carlos Queiroz’ men had a half dozen further excellent scoring opportunities still before the break, but were too sloppy in front of goal.<\/p>\n

Iran increased tempo and pressure in second half and the visitors soon got exhausted and were lucky not to suffer a thrashing like the legendary 0-17 in 1997. <\/p>\n

The homeside, meanwhile playing a 4-2-4, launched wave after wave of attacks on the Maldives’ goal and in several periods create chances in minute cycles.<\/p>\n

Ansarifard doubled the lead when he got his foot to an attempted clearance after a Hadi Aghily cross and the ball just crossed the line before a defender could hit the ball away (62′).<\/p>\n

In minute 68, skipper Ali Karimi scored Iran’s third, when he headed home a corner kick from the superb Khalatbari. <\/p>\n

Substitute striker Saeid Daghighi added a very much overdue fourth goal when he got to the end of Ansarifard’s serving from the right at the far post, four minutes from time. <\/p>\n

Should Iran take the return leg seriously and improve their effectiveness, Iranian fans could experience a real goal festival.<\/p>\n

Iran – Maldives 4-0 (1-0)<\/strong>
2014 World Cup qualification Round 2, Tehran, Azadi stadium<\/p>\n

Goals:<\/strong>
1-0 Karim Ansarifard (4′ \/ assist by Mohammad-Reza Khalatbari)
2-0 Karim Ansarifard (62′ \/ Hadi Aghily)
3-0 Ali Karimi (68′ \/ Mohammad-Reza Khalatbari)
4-0 Saeid Daghighi (86′ \/ Karim Ansarifard)<\/p>\n

Iran:<\/strong> Rahmati – K. Heydari, Aghily, Hosseini Pouladi (62′ Hajsafi) – Karimi, M. Zare (61′ Ghazi), Hadadifar – H. Norouzi (82′ Daghighi), Ansarifard, Khalatbari<\/p>\n

Iranian players booked:<\/strong> Ansarifard, Zare, Karimi<\/p>\n

Full game highlights on PFDCTV<\/span>:<\/strong><\/div>\nhttps:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=0ZFPjml96yc<\/a>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

PFDC – TEHRAN, Iran scored a comfortable 4-0 win over a helpless Maldives in the…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":22614,"featured_media":11647,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[86],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-12315","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-c13-team-melli-news"],"views":8945,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.persianfootball.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12315","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.persianfootball.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.persianfootball.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.persianfootball.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/22614"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.persianfootball.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=12315"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.persianfootball.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12315\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.persianfootball.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/11647"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.persianfootball.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=12315"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.persianfootball.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=12315"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.persianfootball.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=12315"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}