AFC Futsal Championship Second Place Unacceptable, Coach Nazemosharia Says
TEHRAN (Tasnim) – Iranian national futsal team's head coach Mohammad Nazemosharia says that “second place is unacceptable” for the 10-time champion in the AFC Futsal Championships 2016.
The Iranian team will open the campaign on Wednesday with Jordan in Group B.
The Iranian team will face China and Iraq, respectively, on Friday and Sunday.
“All Iranian fans expect us to be champion and that is our sole aim, there is no thought of anything else – second place is unacceptable,” Nazemosharia said in the pre-match news conference.
“Japan has great organization and a huge budget for futsal and that helped them to become champion last time, but we are also in great shape. Iran has good talents, we have strong players and we come only with the aim of being champion,” he added.
“We have a strong league and the players prepared well there and in addition our team has a wonderful unity to it, but if you look at some of the improvements other Asian nations are making, this will be a unique tournament,” added Nazemosharia.
“All the teams come expecting results and to improve and you consider a country like Uzbekistan who had a one-year preparation with the sole aim of winning as host.
“Thailand has had a very good schedule of friendly matches, Iraq came from a training camp to here, China hosted and paid for us to go to a four-nation tournament that showed they have a good programme and are improving too,” Nazemosharia told the-afc.
“But the most important thing for us is that we are like a big family here, everyone is on the same page and working towards the same goal,” Iran futsal coach concluded.