The head of Iranian soccer has explained away Iran’s failure to reach the quarterfinals of the Asian Cup by saying Iran just does not have quality players. Ali Kaffashian (photo), president of the Iranian Football Federation, told the Mehr news agency, “Unfortunately, we don’t have quality players in Iran. According to world standards, a soccer player must run more than 12 kilometers during a match. Iranian players run less than 10 kilometers.” Kaffashian also blamed money, saying other countries invest a lot of state funds in developing soccer. He said South Korea spends $160 million a year on soccer or 20 times more than Iran. He said other countries also get heavy funding from broadcasting contracts. Many Asian countries, he said, get two-thirds of their budgets from broadcasting rights while the Iranian federation gets just 5 percent of its budget that way.
