It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Saba this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Milad 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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Saba this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Milad 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.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Saba can pretend not to have heard.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Saba have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Nicolás Oroz 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 an age at which every good afternoon gets described as a throwback, which is unfair and also accurate. 8.19 at 33, 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.” Saba have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Nicolás Oroz 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.
Saba spent a month trying to move him and nobody rang back. He trains with a squad that has told him where he stands, and both sides start counting down to the next one.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Saba 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: Ahmad Gholizadeh. 1‑0 against Saipa, and the applause at the whistle was mostly his.
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.
$5.1M 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.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Saba can pretend not to have heard.
He is going to Seattle Sounders, the club has $5.1M it did not have on Friday, and the phone-ins have already decided how they feel about that. Selling well and selling somebody they loved are not the same skill.
Involvement in 3 goals, from a player who spent the ninety minutes doing the thing a manager actually wants: being where the ball was going to end up. 7.62 beside his name.
Saeid Karimazar 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.
Squad9 Aug 2027
Nicolás Oroz 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.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Saba can pretend not to have heard.
Nicolás Oroz 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.
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.
Clubs spend fortunes looking for players and occasionally find one down the corridor. Ehsan Khodadad is that, and the reception he gets on his first appearance will be different in kind from the one any signing receives.
The academy exists for exactly this morning. Saeid Cheshmi 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.
“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 Saba know it.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Saba this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Kaveh Beiranvand 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.
There is a version of every career where the player ends up somewhere he chose rather than somewhere that chose him. Faxriddin Muhammadov is living that version at Saba, and it tends to show in the first month.
In brief
SquadWords at Saba training over how hard people work
Siah Jamegan arrived with $310.0K and left with the best player in the building. The board will call it business; the queue at the ticket office will use other words.
The accountants will call it good business and they will be right, which is not the point anybody outside the boardroom is making. Milad Nekounam was one of the reasons people came, and $310.0K does not replace that by itself.
At 27 the improving is meant to be over. It is not: 3 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.
In brief
SquadWords at Saba training over how hard people work
The phone has started ringing about Alireza Moharrami again, and this time the name on the line is FC Midtjylland. Saba are listening politely and promising nothing.
It is the rarest sequence in football: supporters ask for something, and the club goes and does it. $77.0K for Mehrdad Abdi, and for one week nobody is complaining about anything.
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 Saba this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
The board’s statement ran to three sentences and one of them mentioned results. Hossein Cheshmi has managed long enough to translate: win soon, or the next statement is shorter.
Nothing has been announced and everybody understands what it means. A board that summons the whole football department on a Tuesday morning is a board that has stopped believing the problem will fix itself.
“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 Saba, 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 Saba 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.
The phone has started ringing about Omid Hosseini again, and this time the name on the line is Padideh. Saba are listening politely and promising nothing.
Squad7 Jun 2027
The manager has not finished forgetting Vahid Mohammadi's mistake
Publicly it is behind everybody. It is not behind the man who picks the team, and the only place that shows is a team sheet. He will get another chance; he will get it in a match that matters less.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Saba this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Milad Beiranvand trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
What was said behind closed doors has now been said in front of a microphone. Everybody at Saba can do the arithmetic, including the man it is aimed at.
The official line will be that it was routine. It was not routine, the timing says so, and every person in that room knows what the next bad result costs.
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.
44 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Saba lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
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 Saba this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 23-year-old it feels ownership of. Milad Beiranvand 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.
What was said behind closed doors has now been said in front of a microphone. Everybody at Saba can do the arithmetic, including the man it is aimed at.
An individual honour is a strange thing in a team game, and the best of them are never argued with. He has had the sort of year that ends with his name being read out, and Saba have had the benefit of it.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Saba is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
The name of Vahid Mohammadi has come up in conversations Saba were not part of. Nothing formal, nothing signed — but nothing about it accidental either.
Kaveh Beiranvand 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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Saba this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
There is a version of this player everybody suspected was in there, and on this evidence it is. 8.05, and no argument anywhere in the ground.
Squad14 Dec 2026
The manager has not finished forgetting Milad Beiranvand's mistake
Publicly it is behind everybody. It is not behind the man who picks the team, and the only place that shows is a team sheet. He will get another chance; he will get it in a match that matters less.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Morteza Moharrami 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.
“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 Saba, and it is not being withdrawn.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Saba is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Mohammad Cheshmi 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.
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 23-year-old it feels ownership of. Milad Nekounam 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.
A mark of 7.86, and nobody in the ground would argue with it. He was involved in everything that mattered and most of what did not.
Squad9 Nov 2026
Saman Taremi 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.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 24 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
Vouria Khodadad 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.
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 22-year-old it feels ownership of. Milad Beiranvand 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 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.