Best of Persian Gulf Pro League Win Awards

The Football Federation of Iran awarded the best players of the 2017-18 season of Persian Gulf Pro League on Monday in Tehran.

At the ceremony, FFIRI presented the awards for the best goalkeeper, midfielder, defender, game maker, club, manager and referee team. It also announced the recipients for the Phenomenal Player and Fair Play awards. The federation also commended the Man of the Year for the past season, IRNA reported.

Tehran-based Persepolis football club won five of the ten awards to set a record for the maximum awards received. The club, which finished first last season with 64 points (nine points more than the second team of the table), grabbed the best club award.

In the individual awards, Persepolis striker Ali Alipour won the golden boot for top scorer of the league last season as he netted 19 goals in 30 weeks.

 Now 23 years old, Alipour is the youngest player ever to score in the Tehran derby after scoring in Persepolis 1–0 victory over Esteghlal in 2015 at the age of 19. He is the only player in Tehran derby history so far who has scored the only winning goals in two derby matches.

Despite success in the league career, Alipour has played one game with the national team on the international stage and had no place in the Team Melli squad in the 2018 World Cup in Russia.

Team Melli and Persepolis goalkeeper Alireza Beiranvand won the golden glove for the best keeper after his successful season at the club.

Beiranvand, 25, set a Persian Gulf Pro League record of going 721 minutes without conceding a goal last season which was later broken by Esteghlal goalkeeper Hossein Hosseini who kept his goal shut for 872 consecutive minutes.

Persepolis veteran defender and a former Team Melli member Seyyed Jalal Hosseini won the best defender award at the age of 36.

As was expected, Croatian manager of Persepolis Branko Ivancovic received the award for the best manager of the league after winning the title with the club for the second time.

Vahid Amiri, who recently left Persepolis for the Turkish club Trabzonspor, won the Man of the Year Award for his key role in the club success during the past season.

 Blues Share

Esteghlal FC also had its share of awards with two players among the best.

Defensive midfielder of the Blues Omid Ebrahimi won the best midfielder award. Server Djeparov of Uzbekistan also won the best game maker award.

Ebrahimi played for Team Melli in the Russian World Cup and then made a move to Qatari club Al-Ahli afterwards.

A professional midfielder, Djeparov has won the Asian Footballer of the Year award twice, in 2008 and 2011. Esteghlal manager, Winfried Schaefer received the awards on behalf of Esteghlal players since they were not present at the event.

 Fair Play Award

Players with exemplary behavior have always earned praise at the FFIRI awards ceremony. On Monday evening, former player of Peykan FC Mehdi Shiri, who has joined Persepolis for the upcoming season, was honored with the Fair Play Award.

Ali Qolizadeh of Saipa team was chosen as the Phenomenal Player of the season. He has recently become a legionnaire at the Belgian Charleroi club as the third Iranian player of the team after Kaveh Rezaei and Omid Noorafkan.

Iran referee team at the Russia World Cup including, Alireza Faghani, Reza Sokhandan and Mohammad-Reza Mansouri, received the award for the best refereeing team of the Persian Gulf League. The three-member team officiated three games during the World Cup including the third place play-off between Belgium and England on July 14.