The context of Team Melli’s World Cup campaign cannot be ignored or minimized: they arrived in a country that has spent decades sanctioning them, killing their children, destroying their infrastructure and investing billions in hostility toward them - while also imposing restrictions on their travel and recovery during this cup. Despite all of that, they have continued to play brilliantly. 🇮🇷
Ramin Rezaeian reacts to Iran’s dramatic 1-1 draw with Egypt, sending an emotional message to the Iranian people (translated from Persian):
“I don’t know what to say. I don’t know why we have such bad luck—once, twice, three, four, five times.
I don’t know what our people have done to deserve this.
I hope we can still qualify so they can feel better, they deserve more than this.
We fought as hard as we could. It didn’t matter if we had died tonight. We just wanted to make our people happy.
We have been fighting for months. We never asked for anything in return.
Every one of these players is honorable. We played for the love of our people.
People of Iran, we love you so much. I am sorry, that is all I can say.”