Marked for Ehsan Ghoddos
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad15 May 2028
80 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Rah Ahan lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Market15 May 2028
Ehsan Ghoddos has one foot out of the door
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Rah Ahan they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Squad15 May 2028
Pejman Ebrahimi 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.
Squad15 May 2028
Vahid Beiranvand 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.
Squad15 May 2028
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Charalabos Erotokritou, and the manager let it.
Loan watch15 May 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 Rah Ahan, and 6 appearances in 47 say he has earned the hearing.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad8 May 2028
87 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Rah Ahan lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Squad8 May 2028
Reza Mirzaeian: 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.” Rah Ahan have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Market8 May 2028
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Rah Ahan they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Squad8 May 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 Rah Ahan this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad8 May 2028
Ehsan Ghoddos is a better footballer than he was
Not a run of form — an actual step up, held for months. At 19 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.
Boardroom8 May 2028
$4.8M on the table at Rah Ahan
The board have answered with money instead of encouragement, which is the only answer a manager ever wants. Spending it well is now entirely his problem.
Market8 May 2028
Rah Ahan have made Ángel Vázquez available for transfer. A career at this club is over in all but paperwork.
Boardroom8 May 2028
The Rah Ahan production line keeps running
10 graduates out of an academy now rated 7 out of 20. Clubs this size survive on exactly that, and the town knows every name.
Boardroom8 May 2028
Rah Ahan board back the manager
A public word of support from the board and, more usefully, an understanding about what the next window will look like.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad17 Apr 2028
110 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Rah Ahan lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Market17 Apr 2028
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Rah Ahan is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Squad17 Apr 2028
Pejman Ebrahimi 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.
Squad17 Apr 2028
Vahid Beiranvand 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.
Squad17 Apr 2028
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Vouria Torabi, and the manager let it.
Loan watch17 Apr 2028
“I watch every Rah Ahan game from here. That says everything about where my head is.” The loan at Najran runs its course, but his heart never made the trip.
Market17 Apr 2028
Every press conference now starts and ends the same way: with Vouria Torabi’s future. The manager has run out of new ways to say nothing.
Market17 Apr 2028
Dudu placed on the list
Rah Ahan have made Dudu available for transfer. A career at this club is over in all but paperwork.
Market17 Apr 2028
No fee and no drama: Juan Cázares has signed at Rah Ahan, and the wage bill is the only line that moved.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad20 Mar 2028
138 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Rah Ahan lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Market20 Mar 2028
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Rah Ahan is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Squad20 Mar 2028
Pejman Ebrahimi 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.
Squad20 Mar 2028
Words at Rah Ahan training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Pejman Noorafkan 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.
Squad20 Mar 2028
The manager makes an example of Dudu
“If you cannot run for the shirt, somebody else will wear it.” No name was used and none was needed; every player in that room knew who it was for.
Market20 Mar 2028
“We are a long way apart, and pretending otherwise helps nobody.” Neither side is close, and the calendar is not on the club's side.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Market21 Feb 2028
Ehsan Ghoddos has one foot out of the door
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Rah Ahan they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Squad21 Feb 2028
Pejman Ebrahimi 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.
Squad21 Feb 2028
Vahid Beiranvand 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.
Squad21 Feb 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.
Match19 Feb 2028
0‑1 to Persepolis, and no complaints worth printing. The performance asked for nothing more than it got.
Squad21 Feb 2028
Ali Beiranvand has become a man the manager trusts
Nobody at Rah Ahan will say this on the record and the team sheets have been saying it for weeks. There is a small group in every squad who get picked when the fixture is difficult, and he has joined it.
Player ratings21 Feb 2028
Marked 5.19, and generously at that. Nothing came off, and by the end the crowd had stopped expecting it to.
Player ratings21 Feb 2028
A mark of 5.48 tells the story without any need for embellishment. He will want the tape of this one quietly lost.
Market21 Feb 2028
Every press conference now starts and ends the same way: with Vouria Torabi’s future. The manager has run out of new ways to say nothing.
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Squad14 Feb 2028
“I never wanted to be anywhere else. There is unfinished business here.” Pejman Noorafkan commits to Rah Ahan for another 3 years.
Squad14 Feb 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 Rah Ahan this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Match12 Feb 2028
Whatever happens, Rah Ahan do not lose
6 games unbeaten now. Some were earned and some were survived, but a habit is forming — and habits are the hardest thing in football to play against.
Squad14 Feb 2028
Words at Rah Ahan training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Vahid Beiranvand 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.
Squad14 Feb 2028
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Pejman Ebrahimi, and the manager let it.
Player ratings14 Feb 2028
Marked 8.02 — the sort of number a correspondent writes down twice to be sure. Everything he tried came off, and what he did not try was not worth trying.
Loan watch14 Feb 2028
“I watch every Rah Ahan game from here. That says everything about where my head is.” The loan at Sepahan runs its course, but his heart never made the trip.
Market14 Feb 2028
A conversation is coming this week. Rah Ahan will put a number on him, and from there it stops being football and becomes arithmetic.
Match12 Feb 2028
1‑1, and both dressing rooms will call it two points lost. A draw that asked plenty of questions and answered none of them.