Having fought to win the respect of Iran’s football public, Dragan Skocic now has a World Cup showdown with England and a politically charged clash with the United States to cement his international standing. England manager Gareth Southgate admitted he knew little about the Iranian team his side will face on the opening day of the World Cup after they were put together in Group B at Friday’s draw in Doha. Qatar 2022: African teams land favourable groups in World Cup DrawEngland have been too busy with their own matches, he said.”We know that they finished ahead of South Korea and if they have done that we know they have some pretty good players” said Southgate. The #FIFAWorldCup groups are set 🤩 We can’t wait! 🏆#FinalDraw pic.twitter.com/uaDfdIvbaZ— FIFA World Cup (@FIFAWorldCup) April 1, 2022 FIFA has been urged to punish Iran for refusing to let women into a stadium for their last World Cup qualifier against Lebanon this week. But it is unlikely to impact a sixth appearance at the finals.”We will try to advance. I always said we have a very good team and maybe we can advance for the first time. I think our draw could have been worse, for example, being in the Spain-Germany group. But our work will still be difficult and one cannot expect a simple group in the World Cup. England is the toughest team in my opinion, but our team is good enough to be able to compete with others” Skocic, a former Croatian international player, told Iranian state news agency IRNA on Saturday.19.30: (1.55) Man.Utd. (4.40) Leicester (6.50)England’s research will show that Skocic lifted a demoralized side after taking over from Belgian Marc Wilmots in February 2020 when successive defeats left them in danger of failing to reach Qatar. But the 52-year-old has since led Iran to 15 wins, against one loss, and made them the top-ranked Asian side in the FIFA rankings. Following Wilmots and the Portuguese Carlos Queiroz, who took Iran to two World Cup finals in eight years, was not easy.Two years ago, Spain scored six past Germany. Now they will face off in the biggest tournamentSkocic complained to Iranian media after Iran sealed its place in January that “many underestimated me and didn’t respect me but I’m very happy because I’ve proved myself.” And now he is talking about the potential for upsets and Iran going past the opening groups for the first time.”Football is interesting for people because it is unpredictable. We know that England are better than other teams at the moment but they have to show that in the game” he said. He will be relying on players who went through previous World Cup campaigns, and the likes of Mehdi Taremi at Porto in Portugal, Sardar Azmoun at Germany’s Bayer Leverkusen and Alireza Jahanbakhsh at Feyenoord in the Netherlands who have played European football. But they do not always make life easy for him. Taremi was dropped for two games last year after criticising Skocic.© Agence France-Presse
