Already on the second matchday of the group phase of the Asian Champions League, the rapprochement between the Islamic Republic of Iran and Saudi Arabia on the football field reached massive limits. On Monday evening, the game between Sepahan Isfahan and Al-Ittihad had to be canceled. A bust of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard general Qassem Soleimani, who was killed in an American military operation in 2020, was placed between the players’ tunnel and the playing field in the stadium in Isfahan.
The Saudi club’s players, including Frenchmen Karim Benzema and N’Golo Kanté, refused to play for the Iranian championship runners-up and left. Soleimani was responsible for foreign operations as commander of the Quds Force. In the civil war in Yemen, Saudi Arabia is fighting the Houthi rebels supported by Iran. While the president of the Iranian club accused the opponent of unsportsmanlike behavior, the Asian Football Association justified the cancellation with “unexpected and unforeseen circumstances”. Relevant committees would take up the matter.
Since 2016, matches between Iranian and Saudi Arabian teams had been played on neutral ground. The fact that games were to be played in the respective countries again from this season onwards was seen as an expression of a normalization of political relations. Two weeks ago, Cristiano Ronaldo’s club Al-Nassr beat Iranian champions Persepolis 2-0 in a ghost game in Tehran.
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In Isfahan, 60,000 spectators were expected to watch the game against Al-Ittihad. Even before the game was canceled, Iranian women complained that they had no opportunity to buy tickets. The Iranian officials wanted to meet the demand for equal rights with 200 invited spectators.
