Marked for Shahriar Shojaei
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Player ratings21 Dec 2026
Milad Azmoun beats them one at a time
Successful dribbles: 46. There was always a defender in front of him and there was never a defender in front of him for long.
Squad21 Dec 2026
22 days out for Amir Moharrami after a fracture
A bone, which is the one injury with a calendar attached. Siah Jamegan will name a return date and, unusually for this business, will probably be right about it.
Market21 Dec 2026
“I have given everything here and I need a new challenge.” The request is formal, and the relationship will never be quite the same again.
Match19 Dec 2026
Beaten 1‑2, and beaten fairly. The manager kept his words short afterwards, which was probably wise.
Squad21 Dec 2026
Shahriar 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.
The dugout21 Dec 2026
“The supporters are entitled to be angry. So am I. We will put it right.” 1‑2, a manager saying the necessary things, and a dressing room that heard a different version of them.
The dugout21 Dec 2026
Amir Moharrami asks for a word with the manager
“I would rather say it to his face than read about it.” The meeting was requested by the player, which tells you most of what you need to know.
The dugout21 Dec 2026
Somebody else is better right now than Reza Moharrami
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.
Squad21 Dec 2026
Milad Noorafkan 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.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Steady
Match31 Oct 2026
5‑0, and the margin flattered nobody — it could have carried another goal or two without complaint. Afternoons like this are why people keep coming.
Market2 Nov 2026
“I have given everything here and I need a new challenge.” The request is formal, and the relationship will never be quite the same again.
Player ratings2 Nov 2026
A brace, and Pejman Vafaei takes the afternoon — 9.64
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Pejman Vafaei provided it, and the 9.64 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
Player ratings2 Nov 2026
Two goals and a mark of 8.38 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
Squad2 Nov 2026
A fracture rules Sardor Abdullaev out for 14 days
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Siah Jamegan will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Squad2 Nov 2026
Words at Siah Jamegan training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Majid Vafaei 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 terraces2 Nov 2026
He is 21 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.
Match31 Oct 2026
Siah Jamegan settle it inside twenty minutes
3 goals before the ground had finished arriving. Esteghlal Ahvaz spent the rest of the afternoon playing a match that had already been decided, and everybody in the stadium knew it.
Player ratings2 Nov 2026
There is a version of this player everybody suspected was in there, and on this evidence it is. 8.14, and no argument anywhere in the ground.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Squad21 Sep 2026
A knee injury of the worst kind for Reza Noorafkan
38 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.
Squad21 Sep 2026
58 days out for Sardor Abdullaev after a fracture
A bone, which is the one injury with a calendar attached. Siah Jamegan will name a return date and, unusually for this business, will probably be right about it.
Match19 Sep 2026
6 matches without a win for Siah Jamegan
The run now stands at 6, and the questions being asked around Siah Jamegan are no longer polite ones.
Match19 Sep 2026
4 matches without a goal for Siah Jamegan
The chances are being made and something is happening between the making and the finishing. 4 matches now, and the anxiety in the ground arrives a little earlier every week.
Player ratings21 Sep 2026
Successful dribbles: 22. There was always a defender in front of him and there was never a defender in front of him for long.
Squad21 Sep 2026
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Majid Vafaei was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Squad21 Sep 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 Siah Jamegan this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
The dugout21 Sep 2026
“A point is a point and I will take it, but we should have had all three.” Ahmad Karimi after the 0‑0 draw, and the sentence every manager in the country said at some stage this weekend.
The dugout21 Sep 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.
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Player ratings14 Sep 2026
Successful dribbles: 39. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
Market14 Sep 2026
“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.
Match12 Sep 2026
No end in sight to Siah Jamegan's wait for a win
5 matches now without a victory, and the excuses have worn thinner than the patience. Somebody at Siah Jamegan has to find a result from somewhere.
Squad14 Sep 2026
Words at Siah Jamegan training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Majid Vafaei 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.
Match12 Sep 2026
3 games without scoring. Strikers stop looking up, midfielders take the extra touch, and every shot that clears the bar is followed by a groan that has been building since the last goal.
Match12 Sep 2026
Beaten 0‑1, and beaten fairly. The manager kept his words short afterwards, which was probably wise.
Squad14 Sep 2026
Shahriar Shojaei and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
The dugout14 Sep 2026
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Majid Cheshmi, and the manager let it.
The dugout14 Sep 2026
“We were not good enough today and I am not going to dress it up.” Ahmad Karimi after 0‑1, in the tone of a man who knows the next question and does not intend to answer it.