AFC Champions League: Esteghlal Loses 3-1 to Al-Sadd of Qatar at Azadi Stadium

Esteghlal lost 3-1 to Al-Sadd of Qatar on Monday, September 5, at Azadi Stadium. This match was part of the quarter-finals of the AFC Champions League, with the return leg scheduled for September 26 in Doha. Both teams started the match aggressively, launching attacks on each other's goal. In one of these attacks, an Al-Sadd forward had a one-on-one with Mehdi Rahmati, which Roozbeh Cheshmi deflected for a corner. Esteghlal scored in the 13th minute due to a mistake by Al-Sadd players. A backward pass from an Al-Sadd player was mishandled by the goalkeeper, and the ball entered Al-Sadd's net due to a miscontrol. The first half ended with this single goal in favor of Esteghlal. However, Al-Sadd began the second half with extensive attacks. Al-Sadd scored their first goal in the 60th minute. Following repeated mistakes by Esteghlal's defenders, one of Al-Sadd's players entered the penalty area from the right and scored from a tight angle against Mehdi Rahmati. The attacks from Al-Sadd did not stop with this goal. Three minutes later, Xavi found Baghdad Bounedjah in a suitable space deep in Esteghlal's defense. Bounedjah then left an Esteghlal defender behind and scored again. As Esteghlal pushed forward to recover from this goal, a mistake by Rahmati put an Al-Sadd player in a scoring position, leading to a penalty committed by Esteghlal's defender. Bounedjah converted this penalty into Al-Sadd's third goal in the 75th minute. After the third goal, many fans left Azadi Stadium, and Esteghlal supporters protested with chants against the players' performance. According to Mehr News, Winfried Schäfer, Esteghlal's head coach, said in the post-match press conference, 'We did not have good quality in the second half and could not manage the game well. What we wanted did not happen.' The Esteghlal coach continued, 'One reason for the loss was that the ball came back to us too quickly. In some situations, they became three against four. Neumayr also took good free kicks. I think the change we made was not very good. Xavi repeatedly took the ball and pushed his team forward. We also had problems creating opportunities. But let me say again that in the new game, you will see a new team. I must say I need to change some things around the team, and I will do that.' Esteghlal played with the lineup of Mehdi Rahmati, Voria Ghafouri, Roozbeh Cheshmi, Pejman Montazeri, Armin Sohrabi, Markus Neumayr (Mohammad Danshgar from the 54th minute), Farshid Bagheri, Farshid Esmaeili, Hemam Tariq (Sajad Aghaei from the 80th minute), Morteza Tabatabai, and Alhaji Gero. Al-Sadd of Qatar also fielded: Miguel Pedro Correa, Yasser Isa Abubakar (Hassan Haidoud from the 58th minute), Baghdad Bounedjah (Hamza Al-Sanaji), Hamid Ismail, Abdul Karim Hassan, Jung Woo-young, Gabi, Meshaal Barsham, Ismail Al-Affif (Ali Asad from the 87th minute), and Xavi Hernandez.