How long will Clemente last in Iran?

A good selection well deserved for Iranian team gunning for World Cup 2010 qualification and further than that a hope to advance to round 16 of World Cup Finals to wipe out the disturbing memories of World Cup 2006 campaign.

Putting aside the thought of appointing Clemente much earlier than now instead of hasting time in the past 6 months by our football officials, the critical question remains as how long the successful Spaniard is going to be warmly welcomed by Iranian football officials and Iranian media?

Apart from Branko Ivankovic, being the exception among foreign coaches working in Iran, for having the longest spell in football-crazy land thanks largely to IFF President’s full support back then, all other foreign coaches in charge of Iran national team were sacked from their job in less than a year of managing Iranian team. The reason? Lack of professionalism and long term vision in our football culture. From the impatient, result- oriented mentality of majority of Iranian fans and Iran’s print media with unrealistically high expectations from Iran’s weakened team, undermining opponents’ progress in the last decade, which stems from lack of world football knowledge, to IFF officials demanding Iran’s immediate victories to record under their own achievements, all have led to a very challenging environment for foreign tacticians to thoroughly implement their ideas and witness the results at the right time.

One cannot forget the loads of pressure and bashing Tomislav Ivic were bombarded with by Iran’s print media calling his trainings “an offence to Iranian players’ intelligence” and “causing potential injuries for National team players” in 1998 for his indoor football training with Iran National team prior to Iran’s AS Roma friendly fixture, which shortly after led to his immediate sack without taking the dream flight to France with his team to World Cup 1998. As it was revealed after Iran’s World Cup 1998 campaign managed by Jalal Talebi, Iranian players all credited their strong performances to Tomislav Ivic’s best trainings, calling him “the best coach they have ever had”. Ironically Safaei Farahani who sacked Ivic himself, also admitted several years later that “Ivic was the best coach Iran has ever had in the past 30 years.” So as simple as this example, a foreign coach, no matter how effective and creditable among National team players, can be sacked in Iran by the constant media criticisms and poor results in few games. Those were archive of recent Iranian print media criticisms from the news of Clemente refusing to live in Iran, leading to unmerited private calls to Clemente’s agent “warning him the three year exit ban enforced by IFF, when arriving in Iran”. The roots of such criticisms may all hint at resistance to welcome modern approaches introduced into Iranian football and the costless backstabbing of anyone who manages football differently to that of the old school football management in our country. This is the reality of our football today, which leaves our state of football as unstable as it gets.

In all honesty, as we don’t have a professional league compared to that of Japan and South Korea’s, nor do we have any Olympic team to rely on its youngsters, a truly successful refurbishment of our National team can only be achieved patiently through a long term and well thought game plan, team performance analysis, advanced physical trainings, psychological boost to the players, and crucially implementing the true means of discipline and professionalism in our national team camp.

As patience and time are two key factors of success in professional football countries, even an average club coach in European league teams is given at least an entire season and as much as 38 games to implement structural changes to the weakened team and analyze the team flaws for next fixtures. Let alone Clemente who is being handed a shattered National team, whom have not trained together for more than a week in the last 6 months, half of the foreign based players are regular benchwarmers, players are psychologically frustrated at the shortcomings in Iranian football state in the past year or so, and the team is under pressure of expectations to smoothly qualify for World Cup 2010.

Hence that leads us to the point that, Clemente should be given time and trust in a peaceful environment to implement his tactics, select new young players, bench any regular National team player, train them however he decides, and he should be given numerous chances to experiment losses and victories with our National team to spot Iranian team’s weaknesses and strengths. Let’s for once put aside our egotistic attitude and respect the Spaniard’s 32 years of coaching experience to patiently does his job. Let’s put aside our biases towards certain regular National team players, whom we always want to see in starting line-up regardless of their constant poor form, as well leave aside the grudge against a certainly different management approach under Javier Clemente and support, instead of backstab, the Spanish guest in his task for painting success with Iran National football team, that being Iran’s solid performance in World Cup 2010 and quest for Asian Cup 2011 title. Truly, however painful our qualification road would be to these high profile Tournaments, it is not as crucial as improving the Iranian team into a competitive and consistent National football team, as one remembers back in 30 years ago. So let’s not consent to the repeat of past mistakes including the sacrifice of another decent foreign coach, provoked by certain individuals and groups, which have cost Iranian football dearly in the past.

A coach, who has achieved 4 Spanish Cup titles with Athletic Bilbao and has led Spain to two Quarter Finals in World Cup 1994 and Euro Cup 1996 with an incredible record of 31 unbeaten games with Spanish side, has surely an edge to achieve further success this time with Iran National football team. So let’s change our impatient and bashful attitude inherited by our football culture flaws, and see the outstanding result in Iran National team in a matter of time, shall we?