Marked for Vouria Cheshmi
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Market24 Aug 2026
“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 The request is on a desk at Gostaresh Foulad, and it is not being withdrawn.
Squad24 Aug 2026
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.
Player ratings24 Aug 2026
Ashkan Vafaei did the work nobody counts — 6.77
13 combined actions and 6.77. 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.
The terraces24 Aug 2026
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.
Squad24 Aug 2026
Words at Gostaresh Foulad training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Morteza Noorafkan 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.
Squad24 Aug 2026
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Alireza Vafaei, and the manager let it.
Player ratings24 Aug 2026
Marked 7.38 on an afternoon he ran from the first whistle to the last. Whatever else went wrong, Gostaresh Foulad had the best player on the pitch.
Squad24 Aug 2026
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.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Steady
Player ratings17 Aug 2026
Successful dribbles: 25. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
Squad17 Aug 2026
Sardar Vafaei 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.
Squad17 Aug 2026
Words at Gostaresh Foulad training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Matías Giménez 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.
Market17 Aug 2026
The interest is real enough to have reached print. Gostaresh Foulad have said nothing, which in a transfer window is its own kind of answer.
Market17 Aug 2026
“We are a long way apart, and pretending otherwise helps nobody.” Neither side is close, and the calendar is not on the club's side.
Player ratings17 Aug 2026
The afternoon belonged to Milad Taremi
7.77, and no serious argument from anybody who was there. Gostaresh Foulad had eleven men on the pitch and one of them decided how it went.
Squad17 Aug 2026
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.
Squad17 Aug 2026
The plan did not have a place for Ramin Mohammadi
Nobody at Gostaresh Foulad is suggesting he is out of form. The manager simply wanted somebody with a different set of qualities for ninety specific minutes, and there is nothing a player can train to fix that.
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Player ratings10 Aug 2026
Successful dribbles: 37. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
Squad10 Aug 2026
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.
Squad10 Aug 2026
Shahriar Hajsafi 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.
Squad10 Aug 2026
33 days, the scan says, and scans are kinder than reality. The fixtures in that window have just become somebody else’s job.
Squad10 Aug 2026
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Masoud Shojaei, and the manager let it.
Match8 Aug 2026
0‑1 to Persepolis, and no complaints worth printing. The performance asked for nothing more than it got.
Market10 Aug 2026
“We are a long way apart, and pretending otherwise helps nobody.” Neither side is close, and the calendar is not on the club's side.
Market10 Aug 2026
The shop window has Ali Cheshmi in it
Gostaresh Foulad have let the market know Ali Cheshmi can be had. No price in the advert, but everyone in the trade knows roughly what it says.
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Market3 Aug 2026
The offer from Al-Ra'ed for Alireza Vafaei 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.
Player ratings3 Aug 2026
Alireza Vafaei, 20, plays like he has been here for years — 7.65
A mark of 7.65 means one thing beside a twenty-nine-year-old's name and something else entirely beside a 20-year-old's. Nobody at the ground needed telling which this was.
Player ratings3 Aug 2026
Successful dribbles: 22. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
Squad3 Aug 2026
Sardar Vafaei 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.
Boardroom3 Aug 2026
1 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.
Squad3 Aug 2026
Words at Gostaresh Foulad training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Shahriar Hajsafi 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.
Match1 Aug 2026
Beaten 1‑3, and beaten fairly. The manager kept his words short afterwards, which was probably wise.
Squad3 Aug 2026
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Sardar Vafaei, and the manager let it.
Market3 Aug 2026
There is no fee, no unveiling and no agent on the steps. Alireza Mohammadi 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.