At 34 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 7.98 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.
Ahmad Hosseini 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.
Marked 8.60. Players have careers without a single afternoon like this in them, and he has just had one in front of everybody at Rah Ahan.
Squad27 Sep 2027
Words at Rah Ahan training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Saeid Aghaei 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.
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.
Ahmad Hosseini 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.
Squad13 Sep 2027
Words at Rah Ahan training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Vahid Nekounam 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.
Ninety minutes, no goals, and the argument started before the car park emptied: a point gained, or two thrown away against Zob Ahan? Both sides of it will still be going on Thursday.
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.
There is an age at which every good afternoon gets described as a throwback, which is unfair and also accurate. 8.10 at 34, and nobody on the pitch was better.
“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.
Footballers are asked about their boyhood club so often that nobody listens to the answer. Filip Ret has just signed for Rah Ahan, and for once the answer mattered.
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.
6 goals. Both benches spent the second half looking at each other rather than at the pitch. Purists will complain about Rah Ahan and Saba in equal measure; everybody else had a wonderful time.
Ahmad Hosseini 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 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.
The door stayed shut a long time after the final whistle. What was said in there is between them; whether it worked is between them and Saturday.
Squad30 Aug 2027
6 new faces, and Rah Ahan are still learning each other
A squad rebuilt inside one window pays for it in a currency nobody budgets for. The football is not worse than the sum of the players; it is worse than the sum of the players who have played together before.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the team. 6 saves, several of them the sort nobody expects to see stopped, and a scoreline that flatters everybody in front of him.
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.
It is a specific kind of quiet, a ground watching a winning position dissolve. Gostaresh Foulad kept coming because nothing stopped them, and Rah Ahan will be asked about the last half hour all week.
Two goals and a mark of 8.35 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
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.
“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.
Squad9 Aug 2027
Words at Rah Ahan training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Sardar Ebrahimi 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.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Reza Ghoddos trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
Ahmad Hosseini 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.
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.
Squad2 Aug 2027
Words at Rah Ahan training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Vahid Nekounam 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.
Clubs spend fortunes looking for players and occasionally find one down the corridor. Masoud Hajsafi is that, and the reception he gets on his first appearance will be different in kind from the one any signing receives.
There is no fee, no unveiling and no agent on the steps. Mohammad Khodadad 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. Ehsan Torabi is that, and the reception he gets on his first appearance will be different in kind from the one any signing receives.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Rah Ahan will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
“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 Rah Ahan, and it is not being withdrawn.
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.
In brief
SquadVahid Nekounam falls out with a teammate over standards
28 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.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Rah Ahan will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
“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 Rah Ahan, and it is not being withdrawn.
Squad5 Jul 2027
Words at Rah Ahan training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Vahid Nekounam 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.
Saeid Shojaei 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.
None of them will be seen by anybody outside the training ground for three years, most of them will never play a senior match, and one of them might change the club. That is the whole proposition, and it is why academies exist.
$850.0K is a serious amount of money and it does not play centre-forward. Everybody in the dressing room knows who used to be looked at when it went wrong.
The words a physio says slowly. 36 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.
The accountants will call it good business and they will be right, which is not the point anybody outside the boardroom is making. Hossein Yazdani was one of the reasons people came, and $850.0K does not replace that by itself.
In brief
SquadVahid Nekounam falls out with a teammate over standards
The words a physio says slowly. 82 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.
90 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.
Squad10 May 2027
Words at Rah Ahan training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Vahid Nekounam 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.
104 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.
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.
Squad26 Apr 2027
Words at Rah Ahan training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Vahid Nekounam 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.
The words a physio says slowly. 111 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.
“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 Rah Ahan, and it is not being withdrawn.
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.
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.
“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.
Ahmad Hosseini 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.
Squad5 Apr 2027
Words at Rah Ahan training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Vahid Nekounam 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.
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.
Amadou Niang 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 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.
Squad22 Feb 2027
Words at Rah Ahan training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Vahid Nekounam 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.
At 23 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.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Karim Shojaei will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Rah Ahan the goodbyes have quietly begun.
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.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Rah Ahan can pretend not to have heard.
At 33 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 8.14 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.
The offer from Gostaresh Foulad for Karim Shojaei 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.
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.
At 23 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.
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.
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.
Squad25 Jan 2027
Words at Rah Ahan training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Vahid Nekounam 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.
The name of Karim Shojaei has come up in conversations Rah Ahan were not part of. Nothing formal, nothing signed — but nothing about it accidental either.
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.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 22 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
4 wins on the spin now, and the question has changed from whether the run ends to who ends it. Confidence like this cannot be bought; it has to be earned exactly this way.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Karim Shojaei will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Rah Ahan the goodbyes have quietly begun.
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.
Hossein Moharrami has left for Naft Tehran in a $170.0K deal. The accountants are pleased; the supporters are less certain.
Squad11 Jan 2027
Words at Rah Ahan training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Vahid Nekounam 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.
8 home matches unbeaten. Visiting sides arrive already talking about the atmosphere, which is usually the sign that they have half-lost before kickoff.
In brief
Player ratingsHossein Yazdani was on a different afternoon to everybody else
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 29 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Rah Ahan can pretend not to have heard.
There are footballers who have a good season and footballers a season is remembered for, and the second kind get their names read out in a hall in the summer. Rah Ahan will be quietly delighted and privately nervous.
3 wins on the spin now, and the question has changed from whether the run ends to who ends it. Confidence like this cannot be bought; it has to be earned exactly this way.
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.
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.
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 23-year-old it feels ownership of. Hossein Yazdani 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.
The board had gone up, the arguing had started, and then the ball was in the net in the 93th minute. Padideh will replay every second of the added time for a week.
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Sardar Mohammadi provided it, and the 8.52 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
Ahmad Hosseini 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 shape wanted a different profile against this opponent, which is a real football answer and no comfort at all to the man it is about. He did nothing wrong and he did not play.
In brief
The terracesThe stands have heard the Saeid Shojaei talk too
Player ratingsThe pass was always on for Saeid Shojaei
A brace, and Reza Ghoddos takes the afternoon — 8.46
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Reza Ghoddos provided it, and the 8.46 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
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.
1‑3 to Saba, and no complaints worth printing. The performance asked for nothing more than it got.
Squad14 Dec 2026
Words at Rah Ahan training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Vahid Nekounam 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.
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.
14 combined actions and 7.11. The job he did is the one that shows up as other people looking good, and the only reliable way to notice it is to watch what happens on the afternoons he is missing.
Squad30 Nov 2026
Words at Rah Ahan training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Vahid Nekounam 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.
Amadou Niang 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 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.
Two goals and a mark of 9.04 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
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.
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.
2 goals inside twenty minutes with Sardar Mohammadi in the middle of it, and Siah Jamegan unable to get near the ball long enough to change anything. Some matches are won before the first drink.
“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 4 appearances in 12 say he has earned the hearing.
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Rah Ahan, and both men came out saying it was fine.
Words at Rah Ahan training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Vahid Nekounam 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.
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 23-year-old it feels ownership of. Reza Ghoddos 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.
“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 10 say he has earned the hearing.
Amadou Niang 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 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.
At 33 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 7.97 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.
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.
It finished 3‑1, and it was Ehsan Gholizadeh’s afternoon: on the scoresheet when it mattered, and the reason the points belong to Rah Ahan.
Squad5 Oct 2026
Words at Rah Ahan training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Vahid Nekounam 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.
There is a version of this player everybody suspected was in there, and on this evidence it is. 8.47, and no argument anywhere in the ground.
Player ratings5 Oct 2026
Saeid Shojaei was on a different afternoon to everybody else
8.21. There are performances a supporter describes to somebody who was not there and cannot quite convey; this was one, and the number does not help either.
Two goals and a mark of 8.49 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
Saeid Aghaei 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 Sep 2026
Words at Rah Ahan training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Vahid Nekounam 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.
There is a particular helplessness in conceding 2 times before the twentieth minute. Esteghlal Khuzestan tried to reorganise, Rah Ahan did not allow it, and the result was written long before it was confirmed.
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Rah Ahan, and both men came out saying it was fine.
32 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.
There is an age at which every good afternoon gets described as a throwback, which is unfair and also accurate. 8.07 at 33, and nobody on the pitch was better.
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 had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Rah Ahan, and both men came out saying it was fine.
A brace, and Saeid Shojaei takes the afternoon — 8.49
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Saeid Shojaei provided it, and the 8.49 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
8 goals in one match, Saeid Shojaei on the scoresheet, and a scoreline that will look like a misprint. Neutrals could not have asked more of Rah Ahan and Saba.
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.
At 23 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.
The words a physio says slowly. 21 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.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Rah Ahan can pretend not to have heard.
Successful dribbles: 25. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
Squad24 Aug 2026
Words at Rah Ahan training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Vahid Nekounam 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.
Ahmad Hosseini 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.