Queiroz’s New Generation

In the fourth part of our series on Carlos Queiroz, Payan Yunesipour looks at the widespread support for the Portuguese coach, including from the president — and at the Ministry of Sports’ continued efforts to putting an end to his career in Iran.

After the FIFA World Cup in Brazil, Carlos Queiroz was gone. Optimism about chances for his return was undermined by two factors. The first was the Ministry of Sports’ opposition to renewing his contract. The second was that the Iranian Football Federation was unable to pay the expenses resulting from a new contract. In the summer of 2014, Sky Sports reported that the Mexican national team had entered into negotiations with Queiroz. He was also approached by the English premier league team Tottenham, though no serious offer was made. More serious suitors included two South African professional teams and they were ready to pay considerable sums.

But the players were not willing to let go of Queiroz. They were the first to launch a campaign to support Queiroz. After Iran lost to Bosnia on June 25, 2014 and the team had returned to Iran, Javad Nekounam, who had been captain during the World Cup championship, told the newspaper Khabar Varzeshi that Queiroz had said goodbye to him at the hotel. Nekounam was undoubtedly the player closest to Queiroz. “We talked for a long time but the most important thing that he said was that he had one wish and that was to take Iran to the next World Cup,” he said. 

Ashkan Dejagah told BBC that he was not sure that he would remain with the team if Queiroz were to go. Two other players, Reza Ghoochannejhad and Ehsan Hajsafi, went even further and asked the government to act and bring back Queiroz. Jalal Hosseini said he only understood what football was really about when he played in Queiroz’s team. After all these public comments, football federation president Ali Kafashian told a closed-door meeting with the federation’s board of directors that President Rouhani’s advisors were in favor of keeping Carlos Queiroz.

Kafashian personally started the negotiations, but then the Ministry of Sports closed its doors to Kafashian and all board members. The ministry’s security bureau informed the football federation that the only person allowed into the building for consultation was Mohammad Mehdi Nabi, who was then the federation’s secretary general. Eventually, they agreed to three new clauses in Queiroz’s contract.

The first clause was that the contract would not be automatically renewed and was valid only until the end of Asian Cup games. In the original contract, Queiroz was reappointed automatically for a year after the Asian games.

The second clause was that Queiroz must refrain from publicly criticizing members of the federation, coaches of various football teams and the players.

The third clause, added at the insistence of Queiroz himself, stipulated that the football federation would take action to renovate and modernize the facilities for the National Football Team. Just as in the previous contract, the work was supposed to take three months. Two years on, this modernization has till not taken place.  

It was after the World Cup, not before, that Queiroz made his most dramatic changes to the national team by bringing in young footballers. He included Sardar Azmoun (b. 1990), who had not played for the team at the World Cup, in the main lineup. Other young players brought in included Alireza Jahanbakhsh (b. 1993), Morteza Pouraliganji (b. 1992), Vouria Ghafouri (b. 1987), Omid Ebrahimi (b. 1987) and Ramin Rezaian (b. 1990).

This young team performed brilliantly at the 2015 AFC Asian Cup in Australia, though they fell victim to a referee’s decision.

In the meantime, Queiroz continued to try to endear himself to Iranians. The first thing he said upon arriving in Australia for the tournament was: “I hope that economic sanctions on the Iranian people will be lifted. We are coming here from the heart of sanctions and for years I have learned, like Iranians themselves, what pains these sanctions inflict on the people of Iran.” In another talk with the press before the Iran-Bahrain game he referred to the sanctions as “unjust.”

Victories over Bahrain, the United Arab Emirates and Qatar put Iran at the top of its group, but in the last game against Iraq on January 25, 2015, the Australian referee Ben Williams made call that prevented Iran from advancing to the semi-finals. Iran was ahead 1-0. It seemed likely that the team would have the chance to score further goals. But just before half time, Williams sent Mehrdad Pouladi off the pitch, bringing the Iranian team down to 10 men. In the end, Iran lost 6-7 to Iraq on penalties and was eliminated from the tournament. After the game, Graham Arnold, the former star of the Australian National Football Team, called his fellow countryman’s judgment “shameful.”

But shameful or not, the deed was done — and Queiroz’s opponents in Iran took advantage of it. The Ministry of Sports formed the Workgroup to Study the Qualifications of Foreign Coaches and let it be known that the fate of Carlos Queiroz rested with this group. “What this gentleman [Queiroz] has achieved is fourth place among four teams in the World Cup and elimination from the Asian games.”

But at this point, President Rouhani stepped in again. On January 31, at at a gathering of medal-winners at the Asian Games, he praised Queiroz. Not even one official from the Iranian Football Federation had been invited to the gathering. “It is not right that when an athlete or a team of ours loses, certain people inside the country join their competitors and rejoice,” said Rouhani.

Rouhani then made a direct reference to the Iranian team’s acclaimed performance at the World Cup competitions. “Millions, or perhaps I should say billions, watched our athletes play against Argentina and admired them.”

The Islamic Republic News Agency (IRNA) published an article that said something similar, reporting that some of the national team’s players and Queiroz supporters had accused anti-Queiroz coaches in Iran of being happy the team had lost. “Now Mr. Rouhani has explicitly criticized them,” the article read.

But President Rouhani’s support was not enough. It did not persuade the Sports Ministry to abandon its insistence on getting rid of Queiroz and not renewing his contract. Immediately after the Asian games, the ministry began making fundamental changes to the football federation, Secretary General Mohammad Mehdi Nabi, the federation official who was close to Kafashian and Queiroz was the first one to be removed and replaced by Alireza Asadi as the secretary-general. Later in a radio interview Sports Minister Mahmoud Goodarzi confirmed his role in the change.

Supporters launched an online campaign in support of Queiroz, appealing directly to President Rouhani via his Instagram page. The president’s son, Majid Rouhani, also got involved.

And so the battle continued. 

Read part one: Sports, Politics and the International Stage

Read part two: From Generational Change to Change in Management

Read part three: From a Populist to a Gentleman

Read part four: From a Failed Expulsion to a President's Praise