June 16, 2014 by Plus Ayinor

The Iranians spent a whole lot of time in their Saturday training session on their defence. Apart from the goalkeeper trainer Dan Gasper, there was also another specialist on defence brought in according to Iranian journalists on ground. Gasper however told The PUNCH that they were not planning to defend mainly against Nigeria.

“We work on every individual and on every department. What has taken place does not say anything about how the game will be approached,” he said.

The coach argued that they were ready to play an attacking game as their ultimate desire was to grab the full points at stake but their formation during the nearly two hours training covered by our correspondent at the Corinthians Paulista centre in Sao Paulo suggested otherwise. Their drill laid a lot of emphasis on defending.

The coach added that they were not counting on marking the Nigerian side on one-on-one formation.

“The Nigerians are skilful and highly experienced. Our approach has never been to pick out certain stars to mark. We do collective marking and that is what you will see on Monday.”

An Iranian journalist with the team in Brazil told The PUNCH that the Eagles remain a mystery team for Iran.

Pejman Rahmar said, “Nigeria is mystery for Iran. We met once at the LG but since then we have not played each other; we don’t know what to expect. The Nigerians are experienced and exposed and skilful. What the Iranian team has is that team work.”

-Punch

Posted by admin on Jun 15 2014. Filed under Headlines, Soccer, Sports. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can leave a response or trackback to this entry