Iran’s men’s team was ordered to leave the United States only hours after its Fifa World Cup opener against New Zealand and return to its base in Mexico, cutting short the recovery time it expected to have in California. Amir Ghalenoei said the team had been told after Monday night’s 2-2 draw that everyone had to get on a plane immediately for the 140-mile trip back to Tijuana.
The timing matters because Iran had gone into the match expecting to stay overnight in Los Angeles to recover before heading back to camp the next day. Instead, the team was sent back as soon as possible after the game at SoFi Stadium in Inglewood, the kind of disruption that can matter in a tournament played on short rest and constant travel.
Ghalenoei said the team had been supposed to remain in California until the next day at lunchtime. Mehdi Taremi added that the squad had already spent five hours on the road and going through security checks on the trip from Tijuana to the Los Angeles area on Sunday, turning the return into another long transit day when the players had expected rest.
That is where the story shifts from logistics to friction. Iran says it was planning to stay overnight for recovery, but was told instead to leave immediately. Ghalenoei said, “They didn’t even give us time to recover,” and described the decision as coming from elsewhere, while Taremi said, “We don’t know why they are returning us, to be honest.”
The team’s next group-stage games are against Belgium in Inglewood on Sunday and Egypt in Seattle next week, which leaves little room to absorb the trip back and forth. For Iran, the unanswered question is not whether it can keep playing, but who decided that a World Cup team should be put back on a plane right after its opening match.
