{"id":16300,"date":"2013-11-06T13:05:50","date_gmt":"2013-11-06T21:05:50","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.persianfootball.com\/news\/?p=16300"},"modified":"2013-11-06T13:05:50","modified_gmt":"2013-11-06T21:05:50","slug":"we-are-ready-to-host-big-football-events-rouhani-tells-fifa-chief","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.persianfootball.com\/news\/2013\/11\/06\/we-are-ready-to-host-big-football-events-rouhani-tells-fifa-chief\/","title":{"rendered":"We are ready to host big football events, Rouhani tells FIFA chief"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Tehran Times &#8211; TEHRAN, <strong>Iranian President Hassaan Rouhani says that Iran is fully prepared to host major international football tournaments.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>In a meeting with the president of the F\u00e9d\u00e9ration Internationale de Football Association (FIFA), Josep Sepp Blatter, in Tehran on Wednesday, Rouhani discussed the future of Iranian football and its ability to host the Asian Cup in 2019.<\/p>\n<p>During the meeting, which was also attended by Asian Football Confederation President Sheikh Salman Bin Ibrahim Al Khalifah, Rouhani thanked the two officials for backing Iran\u2019s bid to host the 2019 AFC Asian Cup.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cToday, football is not only a sport, but the shining players are countries\u2019 peace ambassadors to football fields,\u201d Rouhani Said.<\/p>\n<p>Upon his arrival in Tehran, Blatter elaborated on major objectives of his visit to Iran.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe Iranian Football Federation invited me two years ago, but I couldn\u2019t come to Iran, and I also postponed the visit last year. Now it\u2019s a good time to visit Iran because it\u2019s the same time to congratulate them for qualifying to the World Cup 2014,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe people of Iran are happy to be in the World Cup, and this will create a lot of emotions in this country,\u201d the FIFA president said.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThere is also a change in Iran, and that\u2019s why I\u2019m also honored to meet President Rouhani and to speak with him about the future of the country and the future of football because Iran is a big country and has big football.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIran played against the United States in the 1998 World Cup in France and they defeated the United States. This time it could happen again. Iran and the United States could be in the same group, depending on the draw, because both teams have qualified,\u201d Blatter added.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI have also discussed the problems of the sanctions that are still imposed on Iran, which is difficult for us. We can\u2019t help Iran develop or receive FAP (Financial Assistant Program) or to organize Goal Projects\u2026 in this area, they are so much in need of our help,\u201d he stated.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Tehran Times &#8211; TEHRAN, Iranian President Hassaan Rouhani says that Iran is fully prepared to&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":22614,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[84,86,110],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-16300","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-c47-featured-news","category-c13-team-melli-news","category-world-cup"],"views":3546,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.persianfootball.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16300","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=16300"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.persianfootball.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16300\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.persianfootball.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=16300"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.persianfootball.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=16300"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.persianfootball.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=16300"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}