Courtesy: Press TV


Iran in Futsal World Cup quarterfinals

Fri, 10 Oct 2008

Iran has secured its spot in the last eight of the 2008 FIFA Futsal World Cup following a 3-2 victory over the Czech Republic in Brasilia.

The match took place on Thursday at the Nilson Nelson Gymnasium in the Brazilian capital, and Iran's success puts the team firmly into the second round of the championships.

The Asian champions, coached by Hossein Shams, dominated the game from the outset and took the lead in the 17th minute when Ali Hassanzadeh scored from a corner kick.

In the second half, Tomas Neumann's men scored the equalizer through Jan Janovsky but 10 minutes later Iranian skipper, Vahid Shamsaee, promptly restored his side's lead.

The Czech Republic's Martin Dlouhy hit back a minute later to make it 2-2, but Hassanzadeh fired the ball into an empty net in the 39th minute to send the Iranian team through to the quarterfinals for the first time since Hong Kong 1992.

Iran now faces a tough game when they meet host Brazil at 5:00 pm local time on Saturday.

The Iranian outfit will then clash with Ukraine on Sunday and meet Italy on Tuesday.

In other matches same day, Argentina topped Guatemala 2-1, Ukraine thrashed China 4-2 and Spain put Uruguay to a 3-0 rout






Posted by Luca Ranocchiari --> luca.ranocchiari@futsalplanet.com