Marked for Abbas Habibi
From our football correspondent
Steady
Player ratings19 Feb 2029
2 goals, and the second was the one that settled it. Marked 8.71, and he could have had a third with better luck at the near post.
Market19 Feb 2029
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Sepahan is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Squad19 Feb 2029
Mohammad Reza Bordbar was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
Market19 Feb 2029
The general version of this complaint is that a player wants more. The specific version names the thing: he wants to walk out under floodlights against clubs from other countries, and he has stopped pretending otherwise.
Match17 Feb 2029
A 3‑1 win over Naft Tehran, earned rather than given, and the sort of afternoon that sends everyone home talking about next week instead of this one.
The terraces19 Feb 2029
At 20 he is being sung about by people twice his age, which is an affection a signing has to earn over years and a local kid gets for turning up. It is also the hardest thing in football to live up to.
Squad19 Feb 2029
Abel Bustos falls out with a teammate over standards
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
Squad19 Feb 2029
“Nobody here is above being told.” It was not said with a name attached, but the dressing room can count, and so can everybody who was listening.
Squad19 Feb 2029
A season average of 7.22 with 6 goals behind it. Opponents have started planning around him, which is the sincerest compliment football pays.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Match29 Nov 2028
Sepahan through in the cup
A 2‑1 win over Esteghlal Khuzestan, and the draw for the next round can be watched with some interest for once.
Match29 Nov 2028
Sepahan win it in stoppage time
The board had gone up, the arguing had started, and then the ball was in the net in the 111th minute. Esteghlal Khuzestan will replay every second of the added time for a week.
Player ratings4 Dec 2028
7.69, 1 on the scoresheet, and the specific comedy of a back-four player celebrating like somebody who does this every week. He does not, and that is exactly why the ground reacted the way it did.
Squad4 Dec 2028
“The easiest signature of my career.” Iván Sánchez and Sepahan agree another 2 years, and the manager can plan around him rather than about him.
Match2 Dec 2028
Rah Ahan left with the points after a 2‑3 defeat that will take some explaining on the terraces.
Squad4 Dec 2028
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Sepahan this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Player ratings4 Dec 2028
A performance of 9.09 does not come along often, and when it does the rest of the team becomes scenery. He was magnificent.
Squad4 Dec 2028
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Ricardo Alves, and the manager let it.
The terraces4 Dec 2028
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 22-year-old it feels ownership of. Abbas Habibi has it now, and everything he does for the rest of his time here will be measured against the goodwill he was handed for free.
In brief
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Player ratings
Abbas Habibi was on a different afternoon to everybody else
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Boardroom
Nobody left the Sepahan dressing room in a hurry
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Boardroom
Sepahan release $6.2M for the manager
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Squad25 Sep 2028
A knee injury of the worst kind for Arash Rezavand
56 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Sepahan lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Squad25 Sep 2028
A one-man rearguard from Adib Zarei
There were 6 saves in it, and at least three that had no business being saves at all. The ten outfield players owe him a drink and they know it.
Squad25 Sep 2028
Abbas Habibi: that is not what I was promised
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Sepahan have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Squad25 Sep 2028
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Sepahan this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Match23 Sep 2028
0‑1 to Esteghlal, and no complaints worth printing. The performance asked for nothing more than it got.
Loan watch25 Sep 2028
“I am grateful for the games, but I did not become a footballer to be somebody else's spare part.” He wants to be at Sepahan, and 0 appearances in 11 say he has earned the hearing.
Player ratings25 Sep 2028
Successful dribbles: 15. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
Player ratings25 Sep 2028
An afternoon Luca Cura will want back
Marked 5.46. Nothing he attempted worked and by the hour mark he had stopped attempting much, which is the part a manager notices rather than the mistakes.
Market25 Sep 2028
Sepahan have made Luis Ureta available for transfer. A career at this club is over in all but paperwork.
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Squad14 Aug 2028
A knee injury of the worst kind for Arash Rezavand
105 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Sepahan lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Squad14 Aug 2028
Not a run of form — an actual step up, held for months. At 23 he is doing things at this level he could not do at the start of the season, and the coaching staff will tell you exactly which of them.
Market14 Aug 2028
Tractor come back empty-handed
The bid was some way short and Sepahan did not need long over it. Nobody in the game reads a first refusal as the end of anything.
Squad14 Aug 2028
Careers are supposed to plateau and then decline, and the players who ignore that are always the ones who were listening on the training ground. 4 points of it, over months, at an age where the direction normally only goes one way.
Squad14 Aug 2028
Adib Zarei was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
Player ratings14 Aug 2028
There is a version of this player everybody suspected was in there, and on this evidence it is. 9.15, and no argument anywhere in the ground.
Match12 Aug 2028
A 1‑0 win over Esteghlal Ahvaz, earned rather than given, and the sort of afternoon that sends everyone home talking about next week instead of this one.
Market14 Aug 2028
He is 19, and the scouting reports agree on the only line that matters: the ceiling. Signings like this are lottery tickets written by professionals.
Loan watch14 Aug 2028
“I watch every Sepahan game from here. That says everything about where my head is.” The loan at Al Jazira runs its course, but his heart never made the trip.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad7 Aug 2028
A knee injury of the worst kind for Arash Rezavand
114 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Sepahan lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Player ratings7 Aug 2028
2 goals, and the second was the one that settled it. Marked 8.58, and he could have had a third with better luck at the near post.
Market7 Aug 2028
Saba come back empty-handed
The bid was some way short and Sepahan did not need long over it. Nobody in the game reads a first refusal as the end of anything.
Squad7 Aug 2028
Not a run of form — an actual step up, held for months. At 23 he is doing things at this level he could not do at the start of the season, and the coaching staff will tell you exactly which of them.
Market7 Aug 2028
The shirt still fits. Mohammad Javad Akbari is back at Sepahan, and half the ground remembers him in these colours already. Some signings need selling to the town; this one sold itself.
Squad7 Aug 2028
Adib Zarei in a row with a teammate
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Sepahan this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Boardroom7 Aug 2028
Graduation day at Sepahan
5 boys move up, and somewhere in the building the people who coached them at twelve are quietly having the best morning of their working year. Nothing about this shows up in a result and it is why the academy exists.
Squad7 Aug 2028
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Ariel Kippes and Sepahan agree another 2 years.
Player ratings7 Aug 2028
Successful dribbles: 20. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Squad24 Jul 2028
Arash Rezavand damages knee ligaments — 131 days out
The words a physio says slowly. 131 days is what the club will announce and everybody who has heard this diagnosis before knows the number is the least of it: the knee comes back before the player does.
Squad24 Jul 2028
A fracture rules Ehsan Hajsafi out for 28 days
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Sepahan will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Market24 Jul 2028
The bid was some way short and Sepahan did not need long over it. Nobody in the game reads a first refusal as the end of anything.
Market24 Jul 2028
Padideh pay $1.1M, and the deal is done. The number reads well on a balance sheet; whether it reads well on the pitch is next season's question.
Squad24 Jul 2028
Rait Alarcón is a better footballer than he was
Not a run of form — an actual step up, held for months. At 22 he is doing things at this level he could not do at the start of the season, and the coaching staff will tell you exactly which of them.
Squad24 Jul 2028
Ariel Kippes has improved at 34, which nobody expected
Careers are supposed to plateau and then decline, and the players who ignore that are always the ones who were listening on the training ground. 3 points of it, over months, at an age where the direction normally only goes one way.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Squad17 Jul 2028
A knee injury of the worst kind for Arash Rezavand
139 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Sepahan lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Match17 Jul 2028
Sepahan refuse to drop out of the race
Position 1, 51 points, and the result everyone checks first is now theirs. The word is still not being said around the ground, which is how you know everyone is thinking it.
Squad17 Jul 2028
A fracture rules Ehsan Hajsafi out for 35 days
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Sepahan will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Squad17 Jul 2028
Form comes and goes; this has not gone. Mohammad Reza Bordbar is 23, and the version of him training now would not have got into the side he was in a year ago.
Squad17 Jul 2028
At 25 the improving is meant to be over. It is not: 3 points better than the mark taken at the start of the year, which is the sort of thing that happens to players who take the boring parts of the job seriously.
Market17 Jul 2028
The interest is real enough to have reached print. Sepahan have said nothing, which in a transfer window is its own kind of answer.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Squad26 Jun 2028
Ehsan Hajsafi breaks a bone — 57 days out
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 57 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
Market26 Jun 2028
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Sepahan can pretend not to have heard.
Market26 Jun 2028
Naft Tehran come back empty-handed
The bid was some way short and Sepahan did not need long over it. Nobody in the game reads a first refusal as the end of anything.
Squad26 Jun 2028
“I never wanted to be anywhere else. There is unfinished business here.” Mohammad Amin Hazbavi commits to Sepahan for another 5 years.
Squad26 Jun 2028
Adib Zarei in a row with a teammate
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Sepahan this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Market26 Jun 2028
Everyone has stopped pretending: Saba will make the call about Ashkan Alijani this week. Sepahan have a number in mind, and the number is not shy.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Match19 Jun 2028
Sepahan refuse to drop out of the race
Position 1, 51 points, and the result everyone checks first is now theirs. The word is still not being said around the ground, which is how you know everyone is thinking it.
Squad19 Jun 2028
A fracture rules Ehsan Hajsafi out for 65 days
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Sepahan will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Squad19 Jun 2028
Adib Zarei was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
Squad19 Jun 2028
A muscle injury sidelines Milad Zakipour for 17 days
Nobody makes a documentary about a hamstring and everybody in the game fears one. Sepahan will be careful with the return date, because the second one is always worse than the first.
Market19 Jun 2028
The name of Abbas Habibi has come up in conversations Sepahan were not part of. Nothing formal, nothing signed — but nothing about it accidental either.
Squad19 Jun 2028
The medical room confirms 31 days on the sidelines for Danilo De Simone, and a plan built around him now has to be rebuilt.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Squad3 Apr 2028
Saad Al-Sharfa: that is not what I was promised
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Sepahan have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Squad3 Apr 2028
Ali Kolahkaj was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
Squad3 Apr 2028
Words at Sepahan training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Aria Yousefi is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
Boardroom3 Apr 2028
Sepahan release $6.0M for the manager
The board have put money on the table rather than an encouraging word. What happens to it now is somebody else's problem, and somebody else's job.
Loan watch3 Apr 2028
“I am grateful for the games, but I did not become a footballer to be somebody else's spare part.” He wants to be at Sepahan, and 2 appearances in 10 say he has earned the hearing.
Market3 Apr 2028
“They were honest with me, and I would rather know.” Aref Haji Eydi has been informed he is not in the manager's thinking at Sepahan.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Squad6 Mar 2028
A knee injury of the worst kind for Mehdi Limouchi
18 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Sepahan lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Squad6 Mar 2028
Adib Zarei is the hero from the spot
A shoot-out is remembered by its ending, and this one ends with Adib Zarei: 2 kept out, and a set of supporters who will describe every one of them for the next twenty years.
Match1 Mar 2028
Sepahan through in the cup
A 1‑1 win over Siah Jamegan, and the draw for the next round can be watched with some interest for once.
Player ratings6 Mar 2028
Successful dribbles: 32. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
Match1 Mar 2028
Nobody wins at Sepahan
12 home matches unbeaten. Visiting sides arrive already talking about the atmosphere, which is usually the sign that they have half-lost before kickoff.
Squad6 Mar 2028
Form comes and goes; this has not gone. Amir Mehdi Maghsoudi is 20, and the version of him training now would not have got into the side he was in a year ago.
Squad6 Mar 2028
Adib Zarei in a row with a teammate
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Sepahan this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Boardroom6 Mar 2028
Nothing happens for months and then he simply arrives, at no cost, having signed a pre-contract while still turning out for somebody else. It is the least dramatic way to sign a footballer and frequently the shrewdest.
Player ratings6 Mar 2028
It was his to settle and he did not settle it. A long walk back to the halfway line, and a considerably longer week.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Match26 Feb 2028
Some goals win a match and some take one off somebody else. Abolfazl Zadehattar scored in the 85th minute, Naft Tehran had already begun thinking about the journey home, and Malavan took the lot.
Player ratings28 Feb 2028
The hardest thing about being 21 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Abolfazl Zadehattar did not need any: 7.83, and he looked the most comfortable man on the pitch.
Market28 Feb 2028
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Mahyar Zahmatkesh will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Malavan the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Squad28 Feb 2028
Ghaem Eslamikhah was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
Match26 Feb 2028
It finished 2‑1, and it was Abolfazl Zadehattar’s afternoon: on the scoresheet when it mattered, and the reason the points belong to Malavan.
The terraces28 Feb 2028
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 21-year-old it feels ownership of. Abolfazl Zadehattar has it now, and everything he does for the rest of his time here will be measured against the goodwill he was handed for free.
Squad28 Feb 2028
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Farzad Taiebipour, and the manager let it.
Squad28 Feb 2028
Words at Malavan training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Younes Akbarpour is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
Squad28 Feb 2028
Clubs make promises constantly and the page usually only hears about them when they are broken. This one was honoured, and the dressing room noticed that faster than any supporter did.
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Squad24 Jan 2028
“The easiest signature of my career.” Farhan Jafari and Malavan agree another 4 years, and the manager can plan around him rather than about him.
Squad24 Jan 2028
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Malavan this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Match22 Jan 2028
Beaten 1‑3, and beaten fairly. The manager kept his words short afterwards, which was probably wise.
Squad24 Jan 2028
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Farzad Taiebipour, and the manager let it.
Squad24 Jan 2028
Clubs make promises constantly and the page usually only hears about them when they are broken. This one was honoured, and the dressing room noticed that faster than any supporter did.
Player ratings24 Jan 2028
Successful dribbles: 12. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
Player ratings24 Jan 2028
Marked 5.60, and generously at that. Nothing came off, and by the end the crowd had stopped expecting it to.
Player ratings24 Jan 2028
A mark of 5.68 tells the story without any need for embellishment. He will want the tape of this one quietly lost.
Market24 Jan 2028
A season-long look at somebody else’s player: Abbas Habibi arrives from Sepahan with something to prove and a return ticket in the drawer. Good loans make everybody richer; this one starts Saturday.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad17 Jan 2028
A knee injury of the worst kind for Mehdi Limouchi
79 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Sepahan lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Squad17 Jan 2028
A fracture rules Matías Duffard out for 51 days
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Sepahan will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Market17 Jan 2028
“This is not anger. I have thought about it for months, and nothing that has happened lately changed my mind.” The request is on a desk at Sepahan, and it is not being withdrawn.
Market17 Jan 2028
The interest is real enough to have reached print. Sepahan have said nothing, which in a transfer window is its own kind of answer.
Market17 Jan 2028
Sepahan say no — this time
The offer from Esteghlal Khuzestan for Abbas Habibi was heard out and sent back the same day. First bids are rarely meant to succeed; they are meant to find out how loudly the door closes.
Player ratings17 Jan 2028
Successful dribbles: 22. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
Squad17 Jan 2028
Adib Zarei was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
Market17 Jan 2028
Both sides expect a conversation in the coming days. Sepahan will name a price, and everything after that is arithmetic.
Squad17 Jan 2028
“Nobody here is above being told.” It was not said with a name attached, but the dressing room can count, and so can everybody who was listening.
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Squad10 Jan 2028
Mehdi Limouchi damages knee ligaments — 87 days out
The words a physio says slowly. 87 days is what the club will announce and everybody who has heard this diagnosis before knows the number is the least of it: the knee comes back before the player does.
Squad10 Jan 2028
A fracture rules Matías Duffard out for 58 days
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Sepahan will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Market10 Jan 2028
Esteghlal come back empty-handed
The bid was some way short and Sepahan did not need long over it. Nobody in the game reads a first refusal as the end of anything.
Market10 Jan 2028
The fee is $870.0K, the contract is signed, and the argument about whether he is worth it can begin. Tractor drove a hard bargain; time will say who won it.
Squad10 Jan 2028
Adib Zarei in a row with a teammate
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Sepahan this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad10 Jan 2028
Words at Sepahan training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Aria Yousefi is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
Market10 Jan 2028
The phone has started ringing about Abbas Habibi again, and this time the name on the line is Esteghlal Ahvaz. Sepahan are listening politely and promising nothing.
Match8 Jan 2028
Esteghlal left with the points after a 0‑1 defeat that will take some explaining on the terraces.
Player ratings10 Jan 2028
Successful dribbles: 18. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.