The mood at Siah Jamegan has turned into something else
Supporters who sing when it goes badly are supporters. Supporters who gather afterwards are a problem, and everybody inside the building knows which of the two this now is.
Amir Nekounam 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.
“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.
Squad27 Nov 2028
Words at Siah Jamegan training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Mahmoud Khalfan 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 Saman Hajsafi trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
The mood at Siah Jamegan has turned into something else
Supporters who sing when it goes badly are supporters. Supporters who gather afterwards are a problem, and everybody inside the building knows which of the two this now is.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Siah Jamegan can pretend not to have heard.
6 without a win now, and the ground has developed the special quiet of a crowd that expects the worst. One scrappy 1-0 would cure most of it; that is the maddening part.
Squad30 Oct 2028
Words at Siah Jamegan training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Amir 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.
Ativeer Jain 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.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Shahriar Ghoddos trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
The mood at Siah Jamegan has turned into something else
Supporters who sing when it goes badly are supporters. Supporters who gather afterwards are a problem, and everybody inside the building knows which of the two this now is.
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Amir Nekounam and Siah Jamegan agree another 2 years.
Amir Nekounam 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.
Padideh left with the points after a 1‑3 defeat that will take some explaining on the terraces.
Squad2 Oct 2028
Dani Amerr 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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Siah Jamegan this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
“I watch every Siah Jamegan game from here. That says everything about where my head is.” The loan at Al Dhafra runs its course, but his heart never made the trip.
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.
Squad25 Sep 2028
Rafael Perez 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.
It has stopped being a mood in the stands and started being something organised. Boards can ignore a bad atmosphere for a long time; they cannot ignore this stage of it for very long at all.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Siah Jamegan have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Siah Jamegan this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
He will be fined, he will apologise, and he will play on Saturday. The order of those three tells you everything about what a football club actually values.
It has stopped being a mood in the stands and started being something organised. Boards can ignore a bad atmosphere for a long time; they cannot ignore this stage of it for very long at all.
1‑5 to Persepolis, and it was every bit as bad as the number suggests. There are defeats you argue about and defeats you apologise for; this was the second kind.
6 without a win now, and the ground has developed the special quiet of a crowd that expects the worst. One scrappy 1-0 would cure most of it; that is the maddening part.
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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Siah Jamegan this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
6 goals in one match, Saman Hajsafi on the scoresheet, and a scoreline that will look like a misprint. Neutrals could not have asked more of Siah Jamegan and Persepolis.
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.
At 28 the improving is meant to be over. It is not: 4 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.
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.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Siah Jamegan they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Squad31 Jul 2028
Morteza Azmoun has improved at 30, 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.
Yousef Vakia 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.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Siah Jamegan can pretend not to have heard.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Siah Jamegan they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Siah Jamegan this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
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.
Squad10 Jul 2028
Ehsan Ghoddos has improved at 28, 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.
Squad10 Jul 2028
Words at Siah Jamegan training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Dani Amerr 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. 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.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Siah Jamegan can pretend not to have heard.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Siah Jamegan this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
The words a physio says slowly. 64 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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Siah Jamegan this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
86 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Siah Jamegan lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Siah Jamegan they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
93 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Siah Jamegan 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 Siah Jamegan this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
123 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Siah Jamegan lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
“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 Siah Jamegan, and it is not being withdrawn.
3 matches, no goals, and a training ground that has tried everything. It will end — droughts always do — but nobody at Siah Jamegan can tell you which week it ends in.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Siah Jamegan this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Nobody at Siah Jamegan 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.
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.
0‑3 to Tractor, and it was every bit as bad as the number suggests. There are defeats you argue about and defeats you apologise for; this was the second kind.
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.
Yousef Vakia 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.
Successful dribbles: 15. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
Squad14 Feb 2028
Words at Siah Jamegan training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Mohammad Amini 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.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Shahriar Pouraliganji will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Siah Jamegan the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Amir Nekounam 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.
“I have given this everything, but my family is not here and neither am I, not really.” A footballer can be coached out of bad form. Nobody has ever been coached out of this, and Siah Jamegan know it.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Siah Jamegan can pretend not to have heard.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Siah Jamegan this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Ask anyone on the way out what separated the sides and you will get one name: Milad Yazdani. 2‑1 against Esteghlal Khuzestan, and the applause at the whistle was mostly his.
Nobody at Siah Jamegan 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.
7.70, 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.
4 without a win now, and the ground has developed the special quiet of a crowd that expects the worst. One scrappy 1-0 would cure most of it; that is the maddening part.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Siah Jamegan this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Add another name to the list: Esteghlal have asked the question everybody in the game has been asking about Shahriar Pouraliganji. The answer from Siah Jamegan has not changed — yet.
Player ratings3 Jan 2028
Milad Yazdani was on a different afternoon to everybody else
8.00. 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.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Siah Jamegan can pretend not to have heard.
Yousef Vakia 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 chances are being made and something is happening between the making and the finishing. 3 matches now, and the anxiety in the ground arrives a little earlier every week.
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.
Amir Nekounam 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.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Omid Vafaei will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Siah Jamegan the goodbyes have quietly begun.
4 without a win now, and the ground has developed the special quiet of a crowd that expects the worst. One scrappy 1-0 would cure most of it; that is the maddening part.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Siah Jamegan this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Siah Jamegan they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Siah Jamegan this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
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.