Editor: Majeed Panahi
IPL Mid-season summary.
The Mid-Season of Iran Professional League has ended on Saturday 23rd
February 2002, with 4 remaining matches of the week 13 being played at
different venues.
Esteghlal Tehran capped a magnificent fortnight by overwhelming Malavan
Bander-Anzali by 4-0, with Ali Reza Vahedi-Nikbakht and Ahmed MomenZadeh
scoring their first league goals this season for Esteghlal. The other
scorer was Fraz Fatemi who has seemed to peek at the right time for
Esteghlal.
The first ever professional league after the revolution has been a mix
of every conceivable event in football. Refereeing controversies, crowd
troubles, program inconsistencies and bad playing surfaces in the
stadiums, where the highlight of the negative aspects of the league.
While on the other hand, the performance of provisional teams, some
excellent matches, and individual players standards were the positives
of the season.
Crowds Attendances.
Crowds' attendances have been disappointing in Tehran, while on the
other hand in the other cities, most of the games involving the big
teams have been sell-outs. As a pi-polar footballing nation, both
Perspolis (Pirouzi) and Esteghlal have enjoyed local support wherever
they have played except for Tehran.
The reluctance of the crowds to attend matches in Azadi is not fully
analyzed although several reasons have strongly attributed to the
disappointing attendance figures. The failure of Team Melli to win a
spot in World Cup 2002 is a prime reason for fans abandoning football in
Tehran. Inappropriate kick-off times, logistics, playing during
weekdays, poor standard of some matches are also contributory factors
for the lack of interest of the Tehrani's in making an effort to watch
matches in Azadi Stadium.
In the provinces, however, the picture is entirely different. Almost all
the clubs enjoyed full capacity when the visitors are Perspolis or
Esteghlal, although the majority of the fans would be supporters of the
guest team. Matches between provincial teams had attracted mixed number
of attendances.
Crowd troubles
Some matches in the provinces have been marred with crowd's trouble.
Although the security measures seem to be tight, there are far too many
events of object throwing and crowd's disturbances reported. One match
between Foolad Khuzistan and Esteghlal Tehran was in fact abandoned due
to unsafe stadium conditions, where stones and other objects were being
showered on the filed threatening player and official. These incidents
were also reported in Shiraz, Esfahan and Mashhad amongst others.
League Organization
As an initial professional league , there has be many organizational
problems that had to be tackled, including the matches schedules itself,
where the participation of the National team in the World Cup qualifying
rounds and the clubs in Asian clubs championship created a scheduling
headache for the organizers. However, the league managed to overcome
these problems and the schedule was nicely balanced and stable by the
end of the mid season.
There are still a lot of question marks about the timing of the matches.
Matches starting early afternoons and during weekdays attract the least
number of crowds, and the league
Organizers seem unwillingly to address this issue.
The Clubs standards.
The success or the failure of any league depends on the standard of the
clubs. Eventually and as usual the teams from Tehran prevailed at the
half way break. Although Zob Ahan , Sepahan and Foolad made some gallant
attempts to threaten the big two (Perspolis and Esteghlal) dominance,
their efforts were hindered by some poor results against other teams.
In general however, the standards were not satisfactory to say the
least. Lack of top class coaches with good knowledge of modern football
coaching techniques has hindered the progress of the league in general.
There were, however, a few numbers of good standard & exciting matches.
With competition heating up and the league sustaining its progress, it
is hoped that the standards are raised in the next few seasons.
Financial resources have also been a major source of worry for the
league clubs. Clubs with large organizations support seem to do better
and have a much stable prospects, while others like Malavan Anzali ,
were just about to be disbanded before an 11th hour rescue plan and
sponsorship from the Navy in Malavan assured the existence of the club
in the league.
Players performances
Many new names have cropped up in the first half of the season and some
brilliant individual performances were witnessed by the crowds. Apart
from the established players, others such as Reza Enayati, the lanky Abo
Moslem Khorassan player, Armanak Petrossian, the Armenian goal keeper of
Foolad Mobarekeh Sepahan, Abbas Aghayee , the highly talented Pas Tehran
forward and Javad Kazemiyan the young Saipa player have been among the
best of the league players.
Among the remarkable individual performances, older stars such as Ali
Akbar Modir-Rosta the ex-National Team player must be mentioned. This
player has rediscovered his scoring touch and his experience has
tremendously helped his club, Paykan, in establishing themselves near
the top of the table.
A special mention should also go to the current Team melli player, Yahya
Golmohamady, who not only been tremendous in defense with his club,
Foolad Khuzistan, but scoring many goals as well, reminiscent of the
goal he scored against Ireland in the last match of WC qualification.
Although the league was marred by some unwelcome events, overall the
positive results can auger well for the future of the league. Matches
involving Esteghlal Tehran have been a delightful to watch. Abo Moslem
have been playing fluid and superb football and are under the auspices
of a young Iranian coach, Sepahan has been a solid team, Paas have
excelled in attack and dented the pride of the other two big Tehran
teams, Foolad has playing a well organized football throughout.
Lack of consistency remains a problem for all clubs. Perspolis is a
prime example. This team can easily win matches against tough
opposition, yet they can falter badly a week later against modest teams.
Perspolis peripheral problems and struggles to administratively control
the club has also been a source of uneasiness and discomfort for the
players and the staff.
www.team-melli.com
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