Marked for Shahriar Shojaei
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad7 Dec 2026
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Shahriar Shojaei and Gostaresh Foulad agree another 2 years.
Squad7 Dec 2026
Words at Gostaresh Foulad training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Majid Karimi 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.
Match5 Dec 2026
Beaten 1‑2, and beaten fairly. The manager kept his words short afterwards, which was probably wise.
The dugout7 Dec 2026
The manager makes an example of Majid Karimi
“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.
Player ratings7 Dec 2026
Successful dribbles: 17. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
The dugout7 Dec 2026
The view from the dugout
“We will look at it, we will learn from it, and we go again.” The three sentences every manager keeps for a 1‑2 defeat, delivered by Amir Jahanbakhsh to a room that had heard them before.
Squad7 Dec 2026
Somebody has moved past him. It is not a dropping and it is worse than one, because a dropping is about a Saturday and this is about where he stands.
Squad7 Dec 2026
A place in the month's best eleven for Prince Guèye
Four or five weekends of consistency, judged against everybody in the division doing his job. Prince Guèye has come out of that comparison in the side, and Gostaresh Foulad have had the benefit of every one of those afternoons.
The dugout7 Dec 2026
Saman Mohammadi dropped after a run of poor form
The one version of being left out a player cannot argue with, and the one he takes worst. Somebody else has been better and the team sheet says so, in public, every week until it changes.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Player ratings23 Nov 2026
Shahriar Shojaei, 35, rolls back the years — 8.03
There is an age at which every good afternoon gets described as a throwback, which is unfair and also accurate. 8.03 at 35, and nobody on the pitch was better.
Squad23 Nov 2026
Prince Guèye 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.
Squad23 Nov 2026
Morteza Khodadad and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Player ratings23 Nov 2026
Successful dribbles: 19. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
Match21 Nov 2026
A 1‑1 draw with Tractor leaves the dressing room somewhere between relief and regret.
The dugout23 Nov 2026
The manager’s verdict
“I am frustrated, honestly. We did enough to win and we did not win.” Amir Jahanbakhsh was not hiding it after 1‑1, and nobody in the Gostaresh Foulad dressing room was either.
The dugout23 Nov 2026
Somebody else has been better, the manager has said so with a team sheet, and there is no argument to be had. He will get the shirt back the only way it can be got back.
Looking ahead23 Nov 2026
Every squad has one of these fixtures for somebody every season. This one is Falah Daram’s: the club that knew him first, the supporters who will decide in the first minute whether to applaud, and Gostaresh Foulad needing him to play as if none of it matters.
Market23 Nov 2026
The Majid Karimi talk will not go away
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Gostaresh Foulad know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Player ratings5 Oct 2026
2 goals, and the second was the one that settled it. Marked 9.02, and he could have had a third with better luck at the near post.
Squad5 Oct 2026
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Majid Karimi was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Player ratings5 Oct 2026
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.
Squad5 Oct 2026
Morteza Khodadad 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.
Squad5 Oct 2026
It happens to all of them and it is still the hardest paragraph a local paper has to write. 35 years old, 3 points down on where he was, and a body that has started charging interest on a career.
The dugout5 Oct 2026
“That is what I want every week. Not the result, the way they went about it.” The manager, after 3‑1, already talking about the next one.
The dugout5 Oct 2026
Somebody else is better right now than Saman Mohammadi
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.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Squad28 Sep 2026
16 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Gostaresh Foulad lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
Player ratings28 Sep 2026
2 goals, and the second was the one that settled it. Marked 8.86, and he could have had a third with better luck at the near post.
Match26 Sep 2026
8 without a win is the sort of run that changes how a town talks about its club, and Saba were the afternoon it stopped. Nothing is fixed by one result and everything feels different by one.
Player ratings28 Sep 2026
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.
Squad28 Sep 2026
Ali Pouraliganji 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.
Squad28 Sep 2026
Majid Karimi 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.
The terraces28 Sep 2026
He is 22 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.
Match26 Sep 2026
Saba made Gostaresh Foulad work for it, but the scoreboard read 2‑0 at the end and the table does not ask how.
The dugout28 Sep 2026
The manager’s verdict
“I am not going to get carried away and I will not let them either. It was a good day. There will be harder ones.” Amir Jahanbakhsh kept it short after the 2‑0 win, which is what managers do when they are happy.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Squad14 Sep 2026
Mohammad Nekounam damages knee ligaments — 30 days out
The words a physio says slowly. 30 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.
Match9 Sep 2026
0‑3 against Persepolis, and the road stops here. Cup exits are quick deaths — no second leg, no next week, just the league from now until May.
Squad14 Sep 2026
8 saves, and a scoreline the ten men in front of him had no right to. Goalkeepers only get noticed on the bad days; this was one of the other ones.
Match12 Sep 2026
No end in sight to Gostaresh Foulad's wait for a win
7 matches now without a victory, and the excuses have worn thinner than the patience. Somebody at Gostaresh Foulad has to find a result from somewhere.
The terraces14 Sep 2026
0-3, and long before the end the away end had switched from encouragement to something considerably more pointed. Nobody rings a phone-in about losing narrowly.
Player ratings14 Sep 2026
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.
Squad14 Sep 2026
Prince Guèye 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 Gostaresh Foulad this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad14 Sep 2026
Majid Karimi 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.
Transfer targets14 Sep 2026
Gostaresh Foulad asked and Tractor said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.