Iran players – Iran’s captain Mehdi Taremi and Mohammad Mohebbi say FIFA’s tight travel timetable around the 2026 World Cup is hurting performance and fairness—after the team arrived late before its June 15 opener and flew back to Tijuana right after drawing New Zealand.
INGLEWOOD, California — On the day Iran played its World Cup opener, the travel plan didn’t give players much time to do anything but keep moving.
Iran arrived late in the afternoon the day before their tournament start on Monday, June 15, before flying back to Tijuana, Mexico, immediately after a 2-2 draw with New Zealand.
“Its not good for the football,” Iran captain Mehdi Taremi said. “I think FIFA can help us more than this. Let’s see what’s going to happen in future.”
The complaints landed directly in front of FIFA leadership. After the match, FIFA president Gianni Infantino visited the team in their locker room, where the players pressed their case.
“He wants to try to help us, but it’s about other things, too. Everyone know it,” Taremi said.
The issue wasn’t just timing for its own sake. Mohebbi described a routine that starts with travel and ends with fatigue. In his account, the day before the match doesn’t allow the kind of recovery time other teams typically have.
“Yesterday we came, start the trip in the morning and we arrive afternoon. We directly go to training and we get tired,” said Mohammad Mohebbi, whose goal in the 64th minute helped salvage the draw. “This kind of thing I think is not a little bit fair. We need to get fair competition.”
Iran say other teams generally arrive two days before their matches. They also note that many teams fly back to their base camps after games, but Iran says it was trying to stay overnight in Los Angeles, recover the next morning, and then return to Mexico.
The criticism comes in a context that Iran’s players say they can’t separate from politics. Iran has been caught in political turmoil between Iran and the United States. The United States began bombing Iran in February, and U.S. President Donald Trump at one point suggested the team should not come to the World Cup.
Iran did come, but it had to move its base camp to Tijuana, Mexico, right before the World Cup began. All of their group-stage games are in the United States—the first two in Los Angeles and the last in Seattle—so the team flies in the day before and leaves right after.
Taremi linked the frustration not only to travel logistics, but to the broader obstacles Iran’s delegation has faced. He referenced the U.S. government’s refusal to grant visas to several members of Iran’s delegation, including federation president Mehdi Taj.
“I don’t know who (is responsible) because it’s between the federation and FIFA … (but) we don’t have our president federation, we don’t have vice president,” Taremi said, referring to Mehdi Taj. “Everything is like disaster actually for us. It’s not the right thing.”
In the hours after the match, the captain and Mohebbi were asked questions about Iran’s situation for more than 10 minutes. They said they appreciated the support they’ve received, but they were tired of being pulled away from football.
“We are here to play football, my friend,” Taremi said. “All the questions … it’s all about the problems. Which is we are tired to talk about that. And if they help us, we are much appreciate about that. If no one help us, doesn’t matter. We just stay back to back behind each other and we try our best to win our next game.”.
Behind the emotion is a plain demand: enough time to recover, enough fairness to compete, and enough help to stop the matchday travel from turning every day into an obstacle course.
Iran national team FIFA Gianni Infantino Mehdi Taremi Mohammad Mohebbi 2026 World Cup travel schedule Los Angeles Tijuana New Zealand United States visas Mehdi Taj