{"id":540734,"date":"2026-03-14T22:03:18","date_gmt":"2026-03-14T22:03:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/540734\/"},"modified":"2026-03-14T22:03:18","modified_gmt":"2026-03-14T22:03:18","slug":"iran-coach-marziyeh-jafari-explains-why-some-players-wanted-asylum-in-australia","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/540734\/","title":{"rendered":"Iran coach Marziyeh Jafari explains why some players wanted asylum in Australia"},"content":{"rendered":"

Comments from an Iranian state television presenter<\/a> about the national women\u2019s team at the Asian Cup<\/a> affected the players psychologically and drove some to seek asylum in Australia, coach Marziyeh Jafari says.<\/p>\n

The Australian-hosted tournament started just as the US and Israel launched air strikes on Iran, killing Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei.<\/p>\n

After the team opted to stand in silence during Iran\u2019s anthem before their first match against South Korea, they were labelled as \u201cwartime traitors\u201d<\/a> by state TV presenter Mohammad Reza Shahbazi.<\/p>\n

Know the news with the 7NEWS app: Download today Arrow<\/a><\/p>\n

In a statement posted by Iran\u2019s football federation (FFIRI) on its Telegram page on Friday, which has since been deleted, Jafari said: \u201cOur girls were affected in the first match by the heavy atmosphere that had been created…<\/p>\n

\u201cBut the greater mistake was made by those who, at home, failed to understand that atmosphere and sounded the call to arms against the daughters of this land,\u201d she added, referring to the presenter\u2019s comments.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat I have asked of the federation is to pursue the matter, because it affected our players psychologically, and we suffered the consequences.<\/p>\n

\u201cI am certain that if that atmosphere had not been created, not a single one of our players would have stayed in Australia.\u201d<\/p>\n

Australia this week granted humanitarian visas to five Iranian players who sought asylum during the tournament. Two more squad members were granted asylum on Wednesday<\/a>, and one decided to return to Iran.<\/p>\n

\u201cAustralian police called the players in several stages and sat down with them one-on-one to persuade them to stay, influenced by the political atmosphere that had arisen,\u201d Jafari said.<\/p>\n

\u201cFortunately, the majority of the team members responded negatively. Even Mohaddeseh Zolfi, who had responded positively, soon changed her mind and, God willing, will come to Iran with the team.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThe rumours about Golnoosh Khosravi and Afsaneh Chatrenoor are also not true at all, and they are now with us in Malaysia and we will be leaving for Iran soon.\u201d<\/p>\n

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<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Comments from an Iranian state television presenter about the national women\u2019s team at the Asian Cup affected the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":540735,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[64,63,596,1625,44,3863,588],"class_list":["post-540734","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-australia","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-football","tag-lifestyle","tag-news","tag-sponsored-content","tag-sport"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/540734","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=540734"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/540734\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/540735"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=540734"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=540734"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=540734"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}