Tehran - Iran's new coach Afshin Qotbi said Thursday he
would focus on the psychological rather than technical and tactical
status of the national football team before the team's three
remaining World Cup qualification games.
'Considering the short time until the next game (June 6), there is
no use on trying to improve the technical and tactical aspects but
the focus should rather be on the psychological status of team and
players,' Qotbi said in an interview with the news network Khabar.
Iran lost 2-1 at home to Saudi Arabia in a qualifier last month to
leave the team little chance of reaching even the third rank in Asia
Group B, which would at least put it into the play-offs.
'What we need right now is to transfer positive energy to both
players and fans. It is more a matter of heart and willingness, and
the next matches must therefore be won first outside and then inside
the field,' Qotbi said.
With only six points from their five games, Iran must still play
against the two Koreas in Pyongyang and Seoul as well as against the
United Arab Emirates in Tehran.
'There is also no time for experiences with new players as we have
to take the most experienced ones for the remaining games,' Qotbi
said.
The Iranian-American, who was last week appointed as new head
coach for Iran's national football team, will visit the Iranians
playing in the English, German and Spanish leagues, and it is
expected that all of them would be invited to the national
team.
Qotbi's problem might however be that players such as Frankfurt's
Mehdi Mahdavikia, Bochum's Vahid Hashemian and Barnsley's Andranik
Teymourian are no longer in the first team and
have not played for a quite long time.
Another problem for Qotbi is that, although the season has already
finished, some of the local players still play with their clubs in
the Asian Champions League games and cannot join the national team
training sessions for the time being.
The new coach however is expected to return former Bayern Munich
midfielder Ali Karimi, who currently plays for Persepolis Tehran and
still considered the country's best player, to the national team.
Karimi was dismissed from the team after he harshly criticized the
Iranian Football Federation (FFI) last year, describing its current
formation as the weakest in his 10-year spell in the national team.
The absence of Karimi was however badly felt in the World Cup
qualification games with most of Iranian fans and also many football
experts believing that the team would have gained better results with
him playing.
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