MHSN

I had seen fans throwing so many things to the pitch. but this ?! how these guys went home after the match ? barefoot ? this is after Qatar's 3rd goal. joking aside. that was very shameful . they thew so many things in several occasions . for what ? just because Qatar beat them fair ? Moez Ali's celebration was provocative but they were throwing things even before that.

I think I'm gonna support Qatar in the final. the semifinal was too easy for them. even though the first goal was a dumb GK mistake. but Qatar plays so good , they are hugely improved comparing to World Cup qualifiers. I still think Japan will be favorite. they just know how to win big games. they change gear when it matters. but it will be stupid to write Qatar off.

of course, and we knew that. Iran will be always a favorite for the Asian Cup (even in 2011 and 2015 when we had not-so-good teams) but that was our best chance here. we also had lots of fans in the stadiums yeah Queiroz said goodbye after the match, and I don't think our next coach will be better than him. I doubt our federation can pay a big coach anymore. they will probably hire a local coach or go after a cheap Ex-Yugoslavian coach. but one thing is for sure, we will be coachless for months !

they returned to the box but all of them behind the Japanese player. of course the cross was perfect but if they were in positions that was no problem to defend that ball. they probably would not even let Minamino to cross the ball. in normal situation Japan can't score a header against Iran. after all mistakes are part of football. but still 5 players doing the same mistake is something I never seen before. and this is probably what we deserve for complaining too much about the refs. that's the stupid culture we have. not just in football. now it's like a national disaster here. the atmosphere is terrible. but at least this time it wasn't in a dramatic way and that was our first defeat in regular time in AFC Asian Cup after 23 years !

This picture was the story of this match Minamino dived for a freekick , the ref called nothing, Rezaeian, Ebrahimi, Hajsafi, Kanaani and Pouraliganji all run into the ref asking for yellow for the Japanese player. but Minamino chased the ball and ... this is probably the difference between Iran and Japan in football. lack of professionalism.

well. 43 years + 4 more and probably more . 6th semifinal defeats in a row for Iran. that was super stupid. extremely stupid. never saw such a thing. what the hell they were thinking ! 5 players forgetting the ball talking to the referee !!! A 5 year old knows to play to the whistle and that one mistake was the end of the match, specially after that cheap penalty. and of course there is a reason Iran never came back after conceding the first goal in 8 years under Queiroz. they just gave up trying after the 2nd goal. only if Azmoun could score that golden chance in first half ... the match was pretty even before that goal and Iran had more dangerous chances but one mistake and everything is gone

in another news ,we had Yarygin tournament in Russia which finished today, Yarygin used to be the hardest freestyle competition in the world but not anymore . since it's now a World Ranking event. each country is allowed to have only 3 wrestlers per weight. and we can't see something like 10-20 VERY good Russian wrestlers in the competition. still a good competition, we had some huge surprises. mostly Taka Akgul losing to Anzor Khizriev !!! and Kyle Snyder losing in first round to some random Russian wrestler. all results available here https://unitedworldwrestling.org/sites/default/files/2019-01/grand_prix_ivan_yariguin_final_book.pdf

it's always hard to find news about Cuba. but we had Greco Takhti Cup in Iran couple days ago and there was a Cuban team there including two time world bronze medalist Oscar Pino and some Iranian journalists asked him about the great Mijain Lopez and what he is doing. according to Pino, Lopez is not retied yet and will try his chance for his 5th Olympics and probably his 4th gold medal which will make him the greatest wrestler ever ! (Aleksander Karelin has 3 gold and 1 silver) we don't see Lopez these days because he is too heavy to make 130kg mark so many times. but he will do that for the Olympics ! Pino himself claims he will try his best to beat Lopez and get selected for the Cuban team but he wasn't very optimistic the way I read his interview. Pino himself is a gold medal candidate, so if Lopez beats him to make the Cuban team, it means he will win the gold probably.

I think the main thing here is "trust" even though I'm no expert in officiating Karate but I know few rules at least and I never fell there is systematic corruption here. there are bad calls here and there. the host nation usually got lucky which happens in every sport (still wrong though but that's tolerable) but I trust the whole officiating system. I can say the same about Judo and nowadays Taekwondo. while in wrestling there are indeed systematic corruption in favor of certain countries. when there is no trust you complain about every single decision (even if some of them aren't that wrong) and boxing is even worse than wrestling

Iran has 1 gold. Japan has 4 but I don't complain if you keep it this way. after all we lost two finals by walkover. we probably deserved one more gold

Abazari also didn't show up in the final apparently got injured in his semifinal. that's a bit unfortunate losing two finals both in the same way ! at least Hassannia won our single gold medal here. 1 gold, 2 silver and 2 bronze. (all in men's kumite) not great but not bad , this was a very high level competition.

OK only two bronze medals for Iran. Asiabari and Ganjzadeh. I didn't see Alipour's match but Poursheib lost in a very stupid way and Abbasali was like a coward the entire match and lost it by a punch in last 20 seconds. there won't be a 84kg final. they didn't let Ghararizadeh to fight in the final because of the dangerous hit he received yesterday. (that's funny Aktas could fight for bronze which he lost)

if I'm not wrong I heard her calling him "Zabih" which is the name he is known by his friends. btw he broke my heart now ! what the hell was that. losing in the very last second for such experienced athlete like him !

yeah thanks, that works with VPN

Is there any youtube livestream for today finals ? I can't find any

some good and some bad results in 2nd day. we will 3 finalists in men's kumite but unfortunately none of them are favorite for the Olympic qualification. none of our veterans made it to the final even Ganjzadeh lost to Arkania in semifinal, Poursheib lost in the first round but later made it to bronze medal match. and Abbasali lost to her old rival Ayumi after beating the World Champion from Greece so, we will have Hassannia (men's 60kg), Ghararizadeh (men's 84kg) and Abazari (men's +84kg) in gold medal match. and Asiabari (men's 75kg), Poursheib (men's 84kg), Ganjzadeh (men's +84kg), Alipour (women's 61kg) and Abbasali (women's +84kg)

that's Ghararizadeh. that's one word. that's similar to Ganjzadeh. -zadeh is a suffix something like -i or -nia or -ian or -nejad. that's a long name probably his friends call him Gharari. but officially that's Ghararizadeh and now we are at it, that 60kg finalist is also Hassannia. but that was hard to find his name .there were lots of "n" and "i" I probably couldn't do that if I didn't know his name in Persian. that was good for him, making it into the final. he is quite unknown and again "not part of the national team program" and not helping our Olympic chance. that's just individual achievement for himself. but I wonder if they let him to participate in the final. he got hit very badly in the semifinal. barely could stand on his foot. and I think they are going to disqualify Aktas for bronze medal match.

and Iranians themselves can't match the dirty style of Aghayev. this is like 10000th times he is beating Iranians. and again not really deserving. I guess they need Busa to take care of Aghayev first I could listen to the Iranian coach during the match and he was really pissed off by Aghayev's acting in last minute. and btw despite being #2 in Iran. Asiabari himself is a 2016 world medalist. and as you probably know the Iranian team was in Italy for few days training with the Italian team. I think it was a very bad day for Iran. we have a finalist in Majid Hassannia but he is not even in national program. and Asiabari (who is fighting for bronze) has no chance for Olympic qualification. on other hand our Olympic candidates Derafshipour and Askari lost very early ! Derafshipour got disqualified controversially vs a former world champion but Askari the current world champion lost to a random Dutch guy ! I thought he is safe for the Olympic qualification but it seems even for him this is still a long road. and our women's team was bad again. they really need to make a change here. something is wrong ! they are losing to average athletes. if they would award points for the countries and not the athletes. we should be fine qualifying in all 3 men's kumitee events comfortably because winning medals by different athletes don't help in term of Olympic ranking. and btw I watch so many sports. and it seems in no other countries coaches speak as much as the Iranians even in Judo (which is illegal for coaches to speak during the actions) our coach got rejected so many times for breaking the rule . it's just like addiction for Iranian coaches. and most of the time it's funny listening to them in live streams.

no It's not like someone put gun on Qatari players and of course that's AFC's fault. as you know they had problems traveling to UAE. our team also had some problems (not as big as Qataris) because our last camp was in Qatar before the cup. but they had to travel back to Iran and then going back to UAE ! and I know the number of Qatari fans wasn't big but sometimes even having 10 men cheering for you can be heartwarming. from what I heard nobody can even carry Qatar's flag. except for their players of course. when Qatar scored against Korea I think I only heard some screams from Qatar bench. and as you probably know Qatari journalists had hard time getting visa. even some Qatari AFC officials had problems. I mean it's like they are completely alone there. just 23 players and coaching stuff. for example I can't say the same about the Iran team

Australia had this coming but UAE also didn't deserve more. that was one huge mistake and UAE took advantage of it. their time wasting in last 10 minutes was disgusting though. they will make it hell for Qatar. it will be even more hostile for them but I think Qatar will be still the favorite. nothing is guaranteed in football but I really think Qatar or UAE won't be that hard for Iran. our real final is Japan.

Qatar in semifinal winning 5 matches, beating KSA, Iraq and Korea. not conceding a single goal ! wow what a tournament for them. specially under hostile situation and not a single Qatari fan in the stadium because of the ban ! I think it's fair to say Qatar will be favorite against either Australia or UAE. Tottenham fans will be happy. they can have Son HM few days earlier

That was easier than my expectation. 3-0 and missing so many chances. but Taremi's 2nd yellow card was a big blow. that was a stupid yellow card yeah he sometimes misses chances 1 meter away from empty goal (as he did again today) but he hustles and creates chances for others as well. we will miss him against Japan. and Japan in semifinal. we were waiting for this for a long time. that's probably our real final.

I think VAR ruined the match first disallowing Japan's goal and later in second half awarding a soft penalty to Japan probably make up for that one in first half ! to me they should only use VAR for obvious mistakes. not for 50-50 calls. I really think in both actions refs had the correct call at first but then changed it to "mistake" after the VAR. btw another narrow win for Japan. actually that's scary. because they can win even when they play terrible ! now can't wait for IRN-CHN match , first let's hope for no VAR decision . and second I hope we win this and finally break the QF curse. we got eliminated 3 times in a row in this round.

and the first VAR decision in history of Asian Cup is something controversial. I think that was no handball on Japan's goal. but they annulled the goal with VAR.

looks like everybody automatically assume Qatar will win the Asian qualifier. they are the favorite but Bahrain was never easy for them. their last match in Jakarta went to extra time .