Shirzanan: she needs to have a surgical operation on her broken foot.

Shirzanan: Shadi Paridar, a member of Iran women’s national chess team and the winner of the first silver medal in Macao Indoor Games, was eliminated by the Iran’s chess federation from the team because she stipulated some conditions for the chess federation. Iran’s chess federation said: “ we don’t care how great she is and even if she is a silver medal winner, we cannot allow any members of the national team to demand personal favors from the federation.”

After two years by defeating India’s football team, Iran Women’s football team achieved a reputation that many couldn’t have imagined. Being qualified for AFC Women’s Asian Cup after only two years of experience is a big step for us. We were calm in the game and organized and we made the day; with our compassionate play we ascended to the AFC Women’s Asian Cup.

For the whole year the team was in the preparatory camps and the result was this Saturday’s match in Tehran. Our players love football and in terms of physical power and technical skills we are in a good shape. In New Dehli, for our first match with India we thought we are going to win but we couldn’t; we didn’t have enough time to cope with their condition; we did not get use to the weather and their food. When we came back from India and for the whole week we said this sentence over and over to ourselves “we should win.” This victory was a very good start for the AFC Women’s Asian Cup.

To continue our progress we need a good coach. For getting to this place our Chinese coach helped us tremendously. But now I think we need a coach, who is in a higher technical level. We need to practice harder and we need to keep up our preparatory camps.

Sepanji, the deputy manager of women’s football federation, who got extremely upset by the security action tried her best to keep Mr. Lotfie in the field, but she did not succeeded. After the match Mr. Lotfie expressed his shock and said he does not know the reason fro his removal from the field by Security guards. He said: “ I dn’t know what was the problem. India’s coach is also a man and Iranian football players where all dressed up on their Islamic sport outfits. They are like my daughters. Iran’s Chinese co-coach also did not wear a scarf; she had a hat. If there were any problem the football federation would not allow me to work as a coach with Women’s team.

Maryam Saedi, one of the audiences, who was very angry about the body search told Shirzanan: “They searched us as if we are carrying a bomb. They took our cell phones away and they said it is because Indian players don’t have proper Hijab but when we got in we saw that both teams have male coaches.” Sara Mohammadi, another audience in Ararat Stadium, said: “It was only an excuse: They took our phones away, but inside the stadium there are more than two men. Many fans had taken their veils and scarves off because they thought we are only women inside.”

The coach of India Women’s national football team: “ It was not a fair match!”

Besides all these troubles that security caused many protested to the referee’s performance during the match. While Iran’s team believed that the referee did not called two definite penalty-faults for Iran, India’s technical staff believed that Iran’s fourth score was a hand-fault and therefore the goal is not legitimate. This controversy cause the India’s head coach’s silence in the press conference held after the match as protest to an unjustified match and instead India’s co-coach spoke and said “ Iran did not play it fair and square.” Against this accusation, Lotfie calmly said: “ Iran’s fourth goal was not a hand-fault; the recordings of this match is available they can watch it to see that the fourth goal was lawful. If the game was not fair it was unfair for Iran more than India. The referee was not brave enough to give us the two penalties we deserved.” He continued that: “ I always tell my players that dribbling is a very valuable technique when you use it to pass to one another and make the space to shoot. But their love for scoring a goal sometimes gets over them; I agree that there was far too much individual playing rather than team playing. I made a note of those and I will warn them about it again.” India’s co-coach said: “ wining or loosing doesn’t matter for us, what matters is a fair and justified game. Because of this we are not happy with the result and we are following up our protest by India’s football federation.”

The Dream of going to a football stadium finally came true.

Besides the sweetness of Iran’s victory, the presence of women audiences in the stadium was one of the most positive achievements in the Iran- India match. Large groups of girls and women within different age groups have come to the stadium to watch the game. Among the crowd the most interesting of all was a group of twenty young schoolgirls who had dyed their faces in the colors of Iran’s flag. A middle-aged woman with a white plastic trumpet was warming up the crowd. A schoolgirl who introduced herself as a basketball player from Tehran’s district number 20 basketball team said: “ I am so happy that the allowed us (women) to come to a stadium today. We cannot go to watch men’s football matches in the stadium. But the experience of coming to a stadium was a dream coming true.”