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.
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.
A midfielder is measured on whether the team functions when he is on the pitch, which is nearly impossible to see and completely obvious in retrospect. 9 actions, 6.90, and a manager who will not be substituting him again in a hurry.
“We were not good enough today and I am not going to dress it up.” Ashkan Hajsafi after 0‑2, in the tone of a man who knows the next question and does not intend to answer it.
Four or five weekends of consistency, judged against everybody in the division doing his job. Hossein Vafaei has come out of that comparison in the side, and Rah Ahan have had the benefit of every one of those afternoons.
There is no complaint available here and everybody involved knows it, which does not make the walk to the bench any shorter. Form is the only currency in football that cannot be borrowed against.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Saeid Irankhah trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
Ehsan Shojaei wins it after the whistle should have gone
90 minutes played. Ehsan Shojaei found the finish in time that only existed because of earlier delays, and Esteghlal Ahvaz went from a point to nothing inside one movement.
“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.
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.
7 signings in three months. Every one of them may be an upgrade and the team can still be worse for a while, which is the part of a rebuild that never appears in the transfer-window verdicts.
“We earned that. I asked them for a reaction and I got one, and now I want the same again on Saturday.” Ashkan Hajsafi on a 1‑0 afternoon that pleased him more than he was prepared to show.
The team sheet says it in public every week until it changes. The only version of being dropped a footballer cannot argue with, and the one he takes hardest.
3‑0, and the margin flattered nobody — it could have carried another goal or two without complaint. Afternoons like this are why people keep coming.
Player ratings5 Oct 2026
A brace, and Majid Torabi takes the afternoon — 8.95
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Majid Torabi provided it, and the 8.95 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
Player ratings5 Oct 2026
Hossein Vafaei, 18, plays like he has been here for years — 7.87
A mark of 7.87 means one thing beside a twenty-nine-year-old's name and something else entirely beside a 18-year-old's. Nobody at the ground needed telling which this was.
At 33 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 8.11 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.
Ahmad Abdollahzadeh 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.
He is 18 and the ground already sings his name, which is a thing that happens to local boys and almost never to signings. Everything from here is measured against an affection he did nothing to earn except be from here.
“The easiest signature of my career.” Vahid Ebrahimi and Rah Ahan agree another 1 years, and the manager can plan around him rather than about him.
The dugout5 Oct 2026
The view from the dugout
“We controlled it. There were spells I did not like and we will look at them, but the group showed me something.” Ashkan Hajsafi, on a 3‑0 win that he was already picking apart on the walk to the press room.
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.
In brief
Looking aheadRah Ahan take on the side everybody is chasing
Rarely has this fixture seen a display like it: 3‑0 against Naft Tehran, and it could have been more.
Player ratings28 Sep 2026
A brace, and Ehsan Ghoddos takes the afternoon — 8.04
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Ehsan Ghoddos provided it, and the 8.04 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
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.
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 20-year-old it feels ownership of. Morteza Vafaei 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.
Marked 8.28 — 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.
The dugout28 Sep 2026
The view from the dugout
“We controlled it. There were spells I did not like and we will look at them, but the group showed me something.” Ashkan Hajsafi, on a 3‑0 win that he was already picking apart on the walk to the press room.
14 times he got in the way of something. Centre-halves get written about when they make mistakes and ignored when they do not, so an afternoon like this needs saying out loud: he is the reason the scoreline reads as it does.
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.
Ehsan Ghoddos 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.
The dugout21 Sep 2026
The manager’s verdict
“That is on me. I pick the team and I picked wrong.” Managers say that when they mean it and when they need to be seen to, and after 1‑2 Ashkan Hajsafi left the room before anybody could ask which.
Ninety specific minutes wanted a different sort of player, and the manager picked one. He is not out of form and he is not in the side, and both are true.
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.
At 22 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.
Marked 8.06 — 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.
He is not being dropped. There is simply nowhere in the formation Rah Ahan are playing to put a man who does what he does, which is a harder thing to be told than any team sheet.
Ehsan Ghoddos and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
Footballers are asked about their boyhood club so often that nobody listens to the answer. Vahid Asgarpour has just signed for Rah Ahan, and for once the answer mattered.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Ahmad Abdollahzadeh was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Siah Jamegan have kept their man, and Rah Ahan go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
A loan enquiry to Olympique Lyonnais: cover, or a look at somebody the club cannot afford to buy yet. Either way the answer will come back inside the week.
“I was told straight, and I would rather have it straight.” The manager at Rah Ahan has been clear about where Mehdi Khodadad stands, which is more than many ever get.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the whole of the defence. 10 saves, several of them the kind nobody expects to see made, and ten outfield players who owe him a drink.
Ehsan Ghoddos and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Boardroom3 Aug 2026
5 academy players handed senior numbers at Rah Ahan
The morning the pathway stops being a brochure and becomes a team sheet. Most of them will not be here in three years; all of them have already done the hard part, which was getting to today.
The academy exists for exactly this morning. Karim Shojaei has come through every age group the club runs and has now been handed a senior number, and the people who coached him at twelve will be the proudest in the building.
There is no fee, no unveiling and no agent on the steps. Alireza Noorafkan has been at this club since he was a boy and is now, formally, one of the first-team squad — which for a local readership beats any signing of any size.
Clubs spend fortunes looking for players and occasionally find one down the corridor. Ashkan Azmoun is that, and the reception he gets on his first appearance will be different in kind from the one any signing receives.
In brief
SquadWords at Rah Ahan training over how hard people work