Iranian Women Enjoyed Watching Football Live For First Time

It has been nearly 40 years since the last time that Iranian women were allowed to watch football live but that all changed on Thursday the 10th of October. They were allowed for the first time since 1981 that women were allowed to attend a football match in their country. It was a huge success and now hopefully it will continue to help the sport grow in the country.

With 4,000 Iranian women looking on in attendance during the match held in Tehran at the Azadi Stadium the men put on a first-class display. They thrashed the Cambodian team in their World Cup qualification game by 14 to nil. While the win was no surprise given that top bookmakers PA betting had them as a massive odds on favorite to get the result, it was the scoreline that shocked the world.

It was a vital match that the Iran team had to win to cement their prospects of reaching the 2022 World Cup. The lifting of the ban which was brought in by the conservative Islamic clerics in 1981 seemed to give the players a boost and helped them to secure an outstanding result.

The first goal of the match was scored by Ahmad Nourollahi in the 5th minute of the game. It was quickly followed by Sardar Azmoun who scored in the 11th, 35th and 44th minute to bang in a hat trick. Hossein Kanaanizadegan scored in the 18th minute followed by Mehdi Taremi who got two goals in the 22nd and 54th minute. Karim Ansarifard managed 4 goals on the night scoring in the 40th, 48th, 60th and 88 minutes of the game. Mohammad Mohebi scored in the 65th and 67th minute with the scoring finished by Mehrdad Mohammadi in the 85th minute.

With Saudia Arabia overturning a ban on women attending games, it left Iran as the only country in the world to forbid women to watch live football matches by attending the games. FIFA the world's football governing body has been applying pressure for the country to change the ban in place for several months and even threatened to expel the country from all of its competitors unless it was overturned.

The 4,000 tickets made available were bought as soon as they were released by the Iran Government. The females who attended were given their viewing section with doctors and female police on hand. One of the promises of giving press accreditation was not delivered but everything else went according to plan.

The main turning point of the ban was when a young woman from Iran attempted to enter the stadium to watch a live game. She was disguised as a man with a fake beard but was caught by authorities and would have been locked up in prison for the offense. Instead of facing this punishment she set fire to herself ending her own life.

There is still a long way to go with regards to completely lifting the ban on women being allowed to attend all types of football matches in the country. The ban is still in place for both domestic and the Asian Champions League so hopefully soon this will also be overturned so all can enjoy the beautiful game no matter their sex.