After Team Melli advanced to the final qualifying round of the 2022 World Cup, Iran Football Federation announced that Dragan Skocic will remain as Iran head coach in the World Cup qualifiers Round 3.
Before his one-week trip to Croatia, Skocic met with the federation president Shahabeddin Azizi Khadem and asked to continue work with the members of the technical staff who accompanied the national team in Round 2 including Persepolis coach Karim Bagheri and Vahid Hashemian.
Bagheri, who has a contract with Persepolis until the end of this season, has not yet made his decision and is to hold a meeting with Azizi Khadem and Skocic to consider their offer.
The Croat and his Iranian coaches led the national team in Round 2, where Team Melli earned four successive wins over Hong Kong, Bahrain, Cambodia, and Iraq in Group C.
Skocic was appointed as Iran coach in February 2020 and under his leadership, Iran has won seven matches in a row.
The draw for the final round of World Cup qualifiers will take place in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, on July 1, where Asia’s top 12 nations will discover their opponents.
The draw will divide 12 teams into two groups of six each, with the winners and runners-up sealing their places for the global showpiece, while the third-placed teams will advance to the Asian playoff to determine the side that will advance to the intercontinental playoff.
Based on the special FIFA Ranking released for Asian teams on June 18, top seeds Japan and Iran will take their places in Pot 1, with Pot 2 comprising Australia and South Korea while Pot 3 will include Saudi Arabia and the UAE.
Pot 4 will contain Iraq and China, followed by Oman and Syria in Pot 5 and debutants Vietnam and Lebanon completing the line-up in Pot 6. The draw will begin with Pot 6, with the first and second balls drawn from each pot placed in Groups A and B respectively until the sequence is completed all the way through to Pot 1.
The qualifiers games are scheduled to begin in September and will continue until March 2022.
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