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A Political History of Football in Iran

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 January 2022

H. E. Chehabi
H. E. Chehabi*
Affiliation:
Boston University
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Extract

In late 1997 Iranian football made international headlines. In an article on the Islamic summit held in Iran, The Economist wrote that almost "anything can become a political football in Iran, including football." This attention was precipitated by the political ramifications within Iran of the national team's tie against Australia in Melbourne on November 29th, which secured it a place in the 1998 World Cup in extremis. Since then, major international soccer games have often given rise to massive street demonstrations by young people. That football should cause so much excitement in Iran is not astonishing if one looks at it from a global perspective. Football is a game in which each team works together to try to occupy as much of the "territory" of the other as it can, culminating in attempts symbolically to "conquer" the other side's stronghold by kicking the ball into the goal. The playing field thus becomes a metaphor for the competition between communities, cities, and nations: football focuses group identities.

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Articles
Information
Iranian Studies , Volume 35 , Issue 4: Sports and Games , Fall 2002 , pp. 371 - 402
Copyright
Copyright © Association For Iranian Studies, Inc 2002

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Footnotes

*

I would like to thank Kamran Aghaie, Peter Alegi, Mehdi Bozorgmehr, Michel Chaouli, Sadreddin Elahi, Parviz Ghelichkhani, Najmedin Meshkati, Sharif Nezam-Mafi, Philippe Rochard, Leyla Rouhi, Manouchehr Sabeti, Cyrus Schayegh, Sunil Sharma, Asghar Shirazi, Amir Soltani, and Mostafa Zamani-Nia for their help and suggestions. All interpretations are mine.

References

1. The Economist December 13, 1997: 37.

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3. For a discussion of the bellicose dimension of football see Kuper, Simon, Football against the Enemy (London, 1995)Google Scholar. For an interesting perspective on the short war between El Salvador and Honduras see Kapuscinski, Ryszard, “The Soccer War,” in The Soccer War, trans. Brand, William (New York, 1990), 157-84Google Scholar. For a study of football in Latin America see Mason, Tony, Passion of the People? Football in South America (London, 1995)Google Scholar.

4. Ghulamhusayn Malik-Muhammadi, Varzishha-yi sunnati, bumi va mahalli (Tehran, 1364/1986).

5. See Philippe Rochard's article in this issue.

6. See Chehabi, H. E. and Guttmann, Allen, “From Iran to all of Asia: The Origin and Diffusion of Polo,” in Sport in Asian Society: Past and Present (London, forthcoming)Google Scholar.

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16. In recent years a plethora of books has come out that document almost every single game played in Iran. See Afrasiyabi, Bahram, Sardārān-i pā bih tūp: Tārīkh-i muṣavvar-i fūtbāl dar Īrān az āghāz tā jām-i jahānī-yi 1998 Farānsih, 2 vols. (Tehran, 1377/1998)Google Scholar; Yikta, Husayn and Nurinizhad, Mahmud, Tārīkh-i fūtbāl-i Īrān (Tehran, 1378/1999)Google Scholar; Sadr, Hamid-Riza, Rūzi rūzigārī, fūtbāl (Tehran, 1379/2000), 15-90Google Scholar; and Mahdi ᶜAbbasi, Fūtbāl-i Īrān: Tārikh-i mustanad va muṣavvar (ĪTehran, 1380/2001)Google Scholar.

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19. Sadri, Abulfazl, Tārīkh-i vanish (Tehran, 1340/1962), 138-139Google Scholar. Sadri calls the Russian method zakulski, which in all probability refers to Sokol gymnastics.

20. See Cyrus Schayegh's article in this issue.

21. Sadri, Tārīkh-i vanish, 138-139.

22. “Khiyālāt,” Kāvāh, n.s. 2 (1921): 1, emphasis added. Iran was of course not the only country in which reformers associated national effeteness with insufficient taste for physical exercise. For the case of France see Weber, Eugen, “Faster, Higher, Stronger,“ chap. 11 in France, Fin de Siècle (Cambridge, 1986)Google Scholar. For India, see Rosselli, John, “The Self-image of Effeteness: Physical Education and Nationalism in 19th Century Bengal,“ Past and Present 86 (1980): 121-48CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

23. For the text of the law see Taᶜlīm va tarbiyat 3 (1306/1927): 1; or Sadri, Tārīkh-i vanish, 139. For a glimpse of Ling's reception in Iran see T, M. M. T.. [Muhammad Muhit Tabataba˒i ?], “Līng: shāᶜir va varzishkār 1776-1839,” Amūzish va parvarish 10 (1319/1940): 15-16Google Scholar, 58.

24. Sadri, Tārīkh-i vanish, 140, 142.

25. Sadri, Tārīkh-i vanish, 139, and Dānish-i vanish 2 (1367/1989): 43.

26. On Britain's export of football to the rest of the world see Guttmann, Allen, Games & Empires: Modern Sports and Cultural Imperialism (New York, 1994), 41-70CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Walvin, James, “Britain's Most Durable Export,” chap. 2 in The People's Game: The History of Football Revisited (Edinburgh and London, 1994), 96-117Google Scholar; and Tony Mason, “English Lessons,” chap. 2 in Passion of the People, 15-26.

27. Kurthan Fi§ek, “The genesis of sports administration in Turkey,” in Ueberhorst, Horst, ed., Geschichte der Leibesubüngen (Berlin, 1989), 6: 626.Google Scholar

28. Sparroy, Wilfrid, Persian Children of the Royal Family: The Narrative of an English Tutor at the Court of H. I. H. Zillu's-Sultán, G. C. S. I. (London, 1902), 255-56Google Scholar. I am grateful to John Gurney for bringing this book to my attention.

29. See, for instance, Howard, R. W., A Merry Mountaineer: The Story of Clifford Harris of Persia (London, 1935), 82-83Google Scholar. I am grateful to J. A. Mangan for this reference.

30. Sipahbud Ahmad Vusuq, Dāstān-i zindagī: Khāṭirātī az panjah sāl tārīkh-i muᶜāṣir 1290-1340 (Tehran, n.d.), 15.

31. In the 1930s, for instance, soccer was also the major sport at the Syrian Protestant College, later renamed the American University of Beirut. Penrose, Stephen B. L. Jr., That They May Have Life: The Story of the American University in Beirut (New York, 1941), 286Google Scholar.

32. See J. Armajani, “Alborz College,” Elr s.v.

33. Boyce, Arthur C., “Alborz College of Tehran and Dr. Samuel Martin Jordan, Founder and President,” in Cultural Ties between Iran and the United States (N.p., 1976), 193-94Google Scholar and 198.

34. Jordan, Samuel M., “Constructive Revolutions in Iran,” The Moslem World 25 (1935): 350-51CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

35. Williamson, J. W., In a Persian Oil Field (London, 1927), 164Google Scholar. For the “international“ character of games between England and Scotland see Moorhouse, H. F., “One State, Several Countries: Soccer and Nationality in a ‘United’ Kingdom,” in Mangan, J. A., ed., Tribal Identities: Nationalism, Europe, Sport (London, 1996), 55-74Google Scholar.

36. This, incidentally, was also an issue in Europe around the same time. In 1913 the yearbook of the German football association carried an article complaining about the shorts worn by football players, which it deemed sittlich empörend (morally disgraceful), and suggested that players wear trousers that did not constrain the knees but covered the thigh muscles. Egger, Heike, “'Sportswear': Zur Geschichte der Sportkleidung,” Stadion 18 (1992): 136Google Scholar.

37. Cf. pre-modern European games in which players kicked an inflated pig's bladder around. Elias, Norbert, “Der Fußballsport im Prozeß der Zivilisation,” in Lindner, Rold, ed., Der Satz “Der Ball ist rund” hat eine gewisse philosophische Tiefe (Berlin, 1983), 16Google Scholar.

38. Yikta and Nurinizhad, Tārākh, 19-22; Kayhān-i varzishī 631 (1346/1967-68): 10, as quoted in Ismaᶜil Shafiᶜi Sarvistani, “Dāstān-i varzish-i mudirn,” Ṣubḥ 7 6 (1376/1997): 33.

39. Sadri, Tārīkh-i vanish, 153. Sadri was the secretary of the association.

40. Baba Safari, Ardabīl dar guẕargāh-i tārīkh (Ardabil, 1371/1992), 3: 240.

41. ᶜAbbasi, Fūbāl-i Īrān, 17-23. The original police reports are reproduced.

42. Akhbār (28 Tir 1377/ July 19, 1998): 5. On the traditional footwear of Iran see Jamshid Sadaqat-Kish, “Giva,” EIr s.v.

43. ᶜ Abbasi, Fūtbāl-i Īrān, 76.

44. Yikta and Nurinizhad, Tārīkh, 34-35, 41.

45. Yikta and Nurinizhad, Tārīkh, 38. Apparently Reza Shah was so upset by the first British goal that he wanted to leave the game, but was deterred by an army officer who argued that the ruler's departure would discourage the players. He stayed, and the Iranians scored two goals. Sadr, Rūzī, rūzigārī, fūtbāl, 21-22 and 84, n. 13.

46. The entire correspondence between various ministries is reproduced in Abbasi, Fūtbāl-i Īrān, 25-56.

47. Kayhān-i varzishī, 631 (1346/1967-68): 10, as quoted in Sarvistani, “Dāstān-i varzish- i mudirn,” 33; and Yikta and Nurinizhad, Tārīkh, 56

48. Kayhān-i varzishī, 637 (1346/1967): 10, as quoted in Sadr, Rūzī, rūzigārī, fūtbāl, 24-25.

49. For the significance of these games for Soviet diplomacy see Victor Peppard and Riordan, James, Playing Politics: Soviet Sport Diplomacy to 1992 (Greenwich, 1993), 101Google Scholar.

50. Yikta and Nurinizhad, Tārīkh, 78-79.

51. Ibid., 22-23.

52. Ibid., 92.

53. Iṭṭilāᶜāt (14 Day 1312/January 4, 1934): 2, as quoted in Yikta and Nurinizhad, Tārīkh, 103.

54. Yikta and Nurinizhad, Tārīkh, 106-108.

55. At the association's first meeting, on April 22, 1934/ Urdibihisht 1313, the top brass of the regime were present: Ibrahim Hakimi, ᶜAli-Asghar Hikmat, Husayn ‘Ala, Amanullah Jahanbani, ᶜIsa Sadiq, Sulayman Asadi, Ibrahim Shamsavari. Nasrullah Hajj- ᶜAzimi and General Dr. Izadpanah, Hajj-ᶜAzimi and Izadpanah, Tārīkh-i varzish-i Īrān (Tehran, n.d.), 135.

56. Tihrān Musavvar (23 Azar 1308/ December 14, 1929): 9, as quoted in Yikta and Nurinizhad, Tārīkh, 77.

57. Hajj-ᶜAzimi and Izadpanah, Tārīkh-i varzish-i Īrān, 137.

58. “Ākharīn jashn-i musābaqa-i fūtbāl,” Taᶜlīm va tarbiyat 4 (1313/1934): 117. See also Taᶜlīm va tarbiyat 5 (1314/1935-1936): 549-551.

59. ᶜIsa Sadiq, Yādigār-i ᶜumr: Khāṭirāti az sarguẕasht, (Tehran, 1975), 2: 172.

60. Tārīkh-i farhang-i Āẕarbayjān (Tabriz, 1956), 318. When the German Orientalist Walther Hinz visited Ardabil in 1938, the local director of education (a representative of the ministry of education) "proudly showed [him] photos of football teams he had created." Walther Hinz, Iranische Reise: Eine Forschungsfahrt durch das heutige Persien (Berlin-Lichterfelde, 1938), 60.

61. For details see Yikta and Nurinizhad, Tārīkh, 162-250.

62. de Villiers, Gérard, L'Irresistible ascension de Mohammad Reza Shah d'Iran (Paris, 1975), 69-70Google Scholar. See also His Imperial Majesty Mohammed Reza Shah Pahlavi Shahanshah of Iran, Mission for my Country (London, 1960), 53, 60, where the shah writes that he "was very proud of winning prizes in. . .throwing the discus, putting the shot, throwing the javelin, the high jump, the long jump, and the 100-metres."

63. "Shirkat-i vālāḥażrat-i humāyūn vilāyat-i ᶜahd dar musābaqa-hā-yi fūtbāl," Taᶜlīm va tarbiyat 6 (1315/1936): 796-99.

64. Yikta and Nurinizhad, Tārīkh, 325, 350-351.

65. Sadr, Rūzī, rūzigārī, fūtbāl, 25.

66. Merrit-Hawkes, O.A., Persia: Romance and Reality (London, 1935), 164-165Google Scholar. The practice of covering one's head made hitting the ball with the head difficult, and the author reports that at one game he saw that the boys would “come on the field wearing their hats, and.. .take them off only when they thought they could get in a hit.” Ibid., 166.

67. Ashna, Hisamuddin, ed., Khushūnat va farhang: Asnād-i mahramāna-i kashf-i ḥijāb (1313-1322) (Tehran, 1992), 30Google Scholar. According to Sadriddin Ilahi, one of Iran's foremost scholars of sport, Kashani may have been thinking of a sports field that had been established on the abandoned cemetery of Imamzadah Yahya in the ᶜUdlajan quarter of Tehran.

68. Sadri, Tārīkh-i varzish, 155.

69. Sadr, Rūzī, rūzigārī, fūtbāl, 30-31. In the end Īrān did not send a delegation to these games at all, probably because Indonesia had incurred the displeasure of the International Olympic Committee by refusing to invite Israel and the Republic of China. Ru˒inpur, Bizhan, Īrān dar bāzī-ha-yi āsiyā˒ī (1951-1970) (Tehran, 1377/1998), 1: 97-99Google Scholar.

70. As is well known, Calcutta is the football capital of cricket-loving India. See Mason, Tony, “Football on the Maidan: Cultural Imperialism in Calcutta,” International Journal of the History of Sport 7 (1990): 85-95CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

71. Sadr, Rūzī, rūzigārī, fūtbāl, 31-33.

72. Richard Giulianotti and Gary Armstrong, “Introduction: Reclaiming the Game —An Introduction to the Anthropology of Football,” in Gary Armstrong and Giulianotti, Richard, eds., Entering the Field (Oxford, 1997), 12Google Scholar.

73. Reppa, Robert B., Israel and Iran: Bilateral Relationship and Effect on the Indian Ocean Basin (New York, 1974)Google Scholar.

74. The football matches between Iran and Israel and their impact on Iranian Jews are discussed in greater detail in Chehabi, H. E., “Jews and Sport in Modem Iran,” in vol. 4 of Yahūdiyān-i Īrānī dar tārīkh-i muᶜaṣir (Beverly Hills, CA, 2001)Google Scholar.

75. Gustav Edward Thaiss, “Religious Symbolism and Social Change: The Drama of Husain” (Ph.D dissertation, Washington University, 1973), 226-27. The story was confirmed to me by informants in Iran.

76. Lewis, Bernard, Semites and Anti-Semites: An Inquiry into Conflict and Prejudice (New York, 1986)Google Scholar.

77. This conforms to a widespread pattern of football matches experienced by the spectators as substitutes for war. See Kuper, Football against the Enemy, especially the Introduction, which relates Dutch reactions to the 1988 victory of the Netherlands’ team against the German team, a victory that was celebrated by otherwise quite reasonable and liberal-minded people as a revenge for the German occupation of the Netherlands more than four decades earlier.

78. This is confirmed by the fact that when bazaar merchants collected money to buy gifts for the Iranian players after the game, they refused to accept the contribution of Jewish merchants, ostensibly on religious grounds. Thaiss, “Religious Symbolism,” 227.

79. On September 16, 1974/Shahrivar 25, 1353 ᶜAlam noted in his diary that on the final day of the Asian Games, Iran had come second, which corresponded to the shah's wish that in Asia there should be two developed nations, Japan in the East and Iran in the West. Yaddāsht-hā-yi ᶜAlam (Bethesda, n.d.), 4: 197-98.

80. The other major football rivalry is between the teams of Bandar Anzali and Rasht, an expression of the rivalry between the two main cities of Gilan province. This sort of rivalry between two teams in the same city or region is very common, to wit the Celtics and Rangers in Glasgow, Boca Juniors and River Plate in Buenos Aires, and Hapoel and Maccabi in Tel Aviv.

81. Manouchehr Sabeti, personal communication.

82. I have this information from Ali Muradi, who as an Islamist militant disrupted football games in Isfahan. Personal communication, Berlin, March 1993.

83. This is analyzed in Bruce Mazlish, The Revolutionary Ascetic: Evolution of a Political Type (New York, 1976).

84. For a left-leaning analysis of Brazil's football craze see Lever, Janet, “Soccer: Opium of the Brazilian People,” Transaction 7 (1969)Google Scholar.

85. Fżtima refers to the site on which the Virgin Mary appeared to three shepherd children in 1917, and fado is the popular music of Lisbon and Coïmbra.

86. Sadr, Rūzī, rūlzigārī, fūtbāl, 29.

87. Sadr, Rūzī, rūzigārī, fūtbāl, 37

88. ᶜAlinaqi ᶜAlikhani, ed., Yāddāsht-hā-yi ᶜAlam, (N.p., 1993), 2:376; 3:194-195; and 4:321.

89. Buytendijk, Le Football, Yl.

90. See Beeston, A. F. L., “The Game of maysir and some modem parallels,” Arabian Studies 2 (1975)Google Scholar.

91. See, for instance, Sayyid ᶜAli Husayni, Tarjumah va tawżīḥ-i Lumᶜah, (Qum, 1994), 2:393-96Google Scholar.!

92. Naciri, Μ., “Die Einstellung des Islam zum Sport,” in Sport in unserer Welt: Chancen und Probleme (Berlin, 1972), 652-54Google Scholar.

93. Weber, Max, The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism (New York, 1958), 166-67Google Scholar.

94. Brailsford, Dennis, “Puritanism and Sport in Seventeenth Century England,” Stadion 1 (1975)Google Scholar. The quote is on 324-25.

95. Iṭṭilāᶜat-i haftagī, 1980 (Isfand 24,1358/ March 15, 1980): 23.

96. I am grateful to Hamid Dabashi for pointing this out to me.

97. Which led supporters of both teams to cover the walls of Tehran with somewhat counter-intuitive graffiti like “death to Independence” and “death to Victory”!

98. One member of the Huma team, Habib Khabiri, who had briefly been captain of the national team and was a Mujahid, was executed in 1983.

99. Kayhān-i varzishī 1327 (Bahman 20, 1358/February 9, 1980), as quoted in Sadr, Rūzī, rūzigārī, fūtbāl, 43-44.

100. Sadr, Rūzī, rūzigārī, fūtbāl, 47.

101. Kayhān-i varzishī 1366 (Azar 15, 1359/December 6, 1980), as quoted in Sadr, Rūzī, rūzigārī, fūtbāl, 44.

102. Personal communication.

103. Jumhūrī-yi Islāmī (Mihr 27, 1362/October 19,1983/12 Muharram 1414): 11.

104. Jumhūrī-yi Islāmī (Isfand 18, 1362/March 8, 1984): 15.

105. Sadr, Rūzī, rūzigārī, fūtbāl, 44—47.

106. The events were analyzed in detail in a series of articles in Kayhān (Mihr 18 1363/October 10, 1984): 19; (Mihr 19, 1363/October 11, 1984): 19; (Mihr 21, 1363/ October 13,1984): 23; (Mihr 22, 1363/October 14, 1984): 19.

107. Quoted in Brailsford, “Puritanism and Sport in Seventeenth Century England,” 325.

108. Interestingly enough, nine decades earlier the government of Sultan Abdülhamit had forbidden football games played by non-foreigners in Istanbul on the same grounds, and disbanded the first Turkish football clubs (Black Stockings and Kadiköy) before the first game was over. Fişek, “The genesis of sports administration in Turkey,” 626.

109. Jumhūrī-yi Islāmī (19 Mihr 1363/October 11, 1984): 10.

110. Jumhūrī-yi Islāmī, (Azar 22, 1363/December 13, 1984): 5; and (Day 3, 1363/December 24, 1984): 7.

111. It is noteworthy that Iranian adolescent POWs at an Iraqi prison camp, who had volunteered for the war, knew all about British football, and that soccer competitions were one of the main attractions of camp life. Brown, Ian, Khomeini's Forgotten Sons: The Story of Iran's Boy Soldiers (London, 1990), 9, 54, 57, 74—75Google Scholar.

112. For instance two articles titled “The role of politics in football” in Jumhūrī-yi Islāmī (Urdibihisht 30, 1365/May 20, 1986): 5; and (Urdibihisht 31, 1365/May 21, 1986): 5, which called football an instrument of imperialism. See also a children's story titled “Who is the champion?,” which contrasts the violence between supporters of rival foot¬ball teams at a game set in 1977 with the harmony and solidarity witnessed by the story's little hero during the ᶜAshura demonstrations of December 1978, a key event in the revolution. Shirazi, Riza, Qahramān kī-eh? (Tehran, 1988)Google Scholar.

113. The similarities between attending a football match and attending a religious ritual are explained in Coles, Robert W., “Football as a ‘Surrogate’ Religion?” A Sociological Yearbook of Religion in Britain (London, 1975)Google Scholar; and Bromberger, “Football as worldview,” 305-11.

114. Risālat (Day 1, 1366/December 22, 1987): 1, 2. Khumayni merely acknowledged what is well known but not commonly talked about in the West. See Guttmann, Allen, The Erotic in Sport (New York, 1996)Google Scholar.

115. The article also claimed that because of these broadcasts government employees came to work tired, having stayed up all night to watch TV. Iran Times (July 15, 1994): 6, 12. On that world cup see John Sugden and Tomlinson, Alan, eds., Hosts and Champions: Soccer Cultures, National Identities and the USA World Cup (Aidershot, 1994)Google Scholar.

116. Sadr, Rūzī, rūzigārī, fūtbāl, 50.

117. Paul, Ludwig, “Der iranische Spitzenfußball und seine sozialen und politischen Dimensionen,” Sozial- und Zeitgeschichte des Sports 12 (1998): 77-78Google Scholar.

118. Gilles Paris, “Tout Téhéran vibre pour les ‘Rouges’ du Pirouzi,” Le Monde (June 25, 1998): 3

119. Paul, “Der iranische Spitzenfußball,” 79; and Christian Bromberger, “Le football en Iran,” Sociétés & Représentations (1998): 107.

120. Women's soccer was declared to be unobjectionable by a number of senior clerics in 1998, and in 1999 the first female indoor tournament was held. But no men were allowed to attend.

121. This is a worldwide phenomenon and has received considerable scholarly attention. See Dundes, Alan, “Into the Endzone for a Touchdown: A Psychoanalytic Interpretation of American Football,” Western Folklore 37 (1978)CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Mariò Suárez-Orozco, Marcelo, “A Study of Argentine Soccer: The Dynamics of its Fans and Their Folklore,” The Journal of Psychoanalytic Anthropology 5 (1982)Google Scholar.

122. Iran Times (July 15, 1994): 6, 12; (July 29, 1994): 6,14.

123. Pahlavān (Shahrivar 7, 1374/August 29, 1995): 7.

124. Iran Times, June 1998, at a seminar on sport and spirituality.

125. Interview, Arzish (28 Tir 1372/July 19, 1993): 12.

126. This division parallels the situation in Turkey, where football is the emblematic sport of the secularists, while wrestling is preferred by more traditional people. See Stokes, Martin, ‘“Strong as a Turk: Power, Performance and Representation in Turkish Wrestling,” in MacClancy, Jeremy, ed., Sport, Identity and Ethnicity (Oxford, 1996)Google Scholar.

127. Sadr, Rūzī, rūzigārī, fūtbāl, 50-53.

128. Morteza Qolamzadeh, “Whatever Happened to Ali Parvin?,” at http://www.iranian.com/Nov95/Parvin.html.

129. Bromberger, “Le football en Iran,” 102.

130. Bromberger, “Le football en Iran,” 103.

131. The Independent (December 6, 1997): 22. This may also have been because the government had given boys’ schools a day off, but not girls’ schools.

132. Bromberger, “Football as world-view,” 302.

133. See, for instance, Zanān 39 (1376/1997).

134. Mason, Passion of the People, 61.

135. Iran Times (January 16,1998): 2; (January 23,1998): 1.

136. From 1973 to 1976 the national team had been managed by the Manchester United coach Frank O’Farrel, but those were more cosmopolitan days.

137. N[awid] K[ermani], “Gut rasiert,” Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung (July 11, 1998): 32.

138. Jere Longman, “Diplomacy and Urgency as the U.S. Faces Iran,” The New York Times (June 21, 1996): C2.

139. Elaine Sciolino, “Singing, Dancing and Cheering in the Streets of Tehran,” The New York Times (June 22, 1998): C9; and Yaghmaian, Behzad, Social Change in Iran: An Eyewitness Account of Dissent, Defiance, and New Movements for Rights (Albany, 2002), 49-54Google Scholar.

140. See Markovits, Andrei S. and Hellerman, Steven L., Soccer and American Exceptionalism (Princeton, 2001)CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

141. Iran Times (June 26,1998): 2.

142. For a more detailed account see Chehabi, H. E., “US-Iranian Sports Diplomacy,” Diplomacy and Statecraft 12 (2001): 89-106CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

143. Klemm, Hans-Günther, “Traum aus 1001 Nacht,” Kicker: Sonderheft (1998): 74Google Scholar; and idem, “Deutschland als Ziel, Daei als Pionier,” Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung (August 20, 1999): 39.

144. Bromberger, “Le football en Iran,” 108.

145. See, for example, Sanadjian, Manuchehr, ‘“They Got Game’—Asylum Rights and Marginality in the Diaspora: the World-Cup and Iranian Exiles,” Social Identities 6 (2000): 143-63CrossRefGoogle Scholar; and “Watching with Pride: Iranian soccer fans excited about match,” San Jose Mercury News (January 16, 2000): 3B, 7B.

146. Fathi, Nazila, “Soccer Melees Keep Erupting in Iran, With a Political Message,” New York Times (October 26, 2001)Google Scholar: A7.

147. Coles, “Football as a ‘Surrogate’ Religion?” 75.

148. Forbis, William H., Fall of the Peacock Throne: The Story of Iran (New York, 1980), 170Google Scholar. For a revealing aperçu of sports life under the shah, see 170-74.

149. Muhandis Sayyid Mustafa Hashimi-Taba, Dāstān-i yak ṣuᶜūd (Tehran, 1376/1997-98), 102-106.

150. Bourdieu, Pierre, “Comment peut-on être sportif?” Questions de sociologie (Paris, 1984)Google Scholar.

151. On the concept of counter-culture in contemporary Iran see Schirazi, Asghar, “Gegenkultur als Ausdruck der Zivilgesellschaft in der Islamischen Republik Iran,” in Probleme der Zivilgesellschaft im Vorderen Orient (Opladen, 1995), 135-63CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

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153. Merrit-Hawkes, Persia, 165.

154. Bill, James A., “The Plasticity of Informal Politics: The Case of Iran,” Middle East Journal 27 (1973): 139-40Google Scholar, quoting Donald J. Linehan, who coached Iran's team 1966-67.

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158. Guttmann, chap. 2 of Games & Empires.

159. Markovits and Hellerman, Soccer and American Exceptionalism.