Iran Prepares for 2018 World Cup Second Stage

Asian Football Confederation (AFC) site has reported that Iran’s national football team will be aiming to advance to the round of 16 in 2018 FIFA World Cup.

Iran was the first Asian team to secure its place at the World Cup Russia. This is the fifth time Team Melli has reached World Cup finals, but has never gone past the group stage.

The Iranian squad seeks to qualify for the next round in the event, to be held in Russia next year, for the first time, the-afc.com wrote.

Iran is still the No. 1 nation in Asia, and is ranked 34th in the FIFA World Ranking. A well-known 2-1 defeat of the US in France 1998 marks Iran’s only win in its previous World Cup appearances in 1978, 2006 and 2014.

Asia will be represented by a historic five nations at the 2018 World Cup for the first time ever. Japan, Saudi Arabia, South Korea and Australia along with Iran will attend the next year’s spectacle in Russia.

  Unbeaten Run

According to FOX Sports Asia, Asian cable sports network, Iran has won 27 out of 38 games since the last FIFA World Cup and should not be underestimated in the Russian games.

Iran is unbeaten in its last ten games and building well ahead of next summer’s World Cup.

Team Melli was the third team to seal a berth at the Russian event, behind host Russia and five-time champions Brazil, after securing qualification back in June.

The benefit of qualifying as early as Iran did is extra time to prepare and get things in order ahead of appearing on the biggest stage in world football.

Iran is doing all that while still churning out positive results.

Since a 1-0 friendly defeat to Iraq in March, they have not tasted defeat in ten matches and have notched seven wins along the way.

Among the positive results are a 1-1 draw against Russia, win over Montenegro and Togo, as well as their most-recent back-to-back victories over Panama and Venezuela with the former also preparing for a maiden World Cup appearance.

Carlos Queiroz deserves all the credit that has been thrown his way recently, for getting Iran to where it is right now: a well-organized, enterprising outfit clearly knowing what to do on the pitch.

Nonetheless, there is also genuine star quality in the team and it should come as no surprise that a significant number of Iranians are now plying their trade in Europe, including big names like Sardar Azmoun, Karim Ansarifard and Alireza Jahanbakhsh.