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Sardar Azmoun is back in Iran’s national football squad after a four-month absence. The striker, who ranks as Iran’s third-highest international goalscorer with 57 goals in 91 caps, was recalled on September 21 for upcoming friendlies against Uzbekistan and Russia.
An Instagram post that cost a World Cup spot
The root of Azmoun’s exile traces back to a March Instagram post in which the forward appeared alongside Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, the ruler of the United Arab Emirates. When Iran’s World Cup squad was announced in May 2026, Azmoun’s name was nowhere to be found. A player who had been a fixture of the national team through two previous World Cup campaigns, in Russia 2018 and Qatar 2022, was watching from the sidelines over what amounted to a social media post.
Iran’s World Cup campaign didn’t vindicate the decision. The team failed to advance past the group stage.
A quiet return, eyes on the Asian Cup
Now playing his club football for Shabab Al-Ahli in Dubai, Azmoun has expressed nothing but happiness at his recall. The friendlies against Uzbekistan on September 25 and Russia on September 30 serve as the immediate objective. The bigger picture is the 2027 AFC Asian Cup, set to kick off on January 7 in Saudi Arabia.
Azmoun’s 57 international goals place him behind only Ali Daei and Karim Bagheri in Iran’s all-time scoring charts.
When politics and sport collide
What makes Azmoun’s case notable is how quickly the door reopened. Four months is a relatively short exile by the standards of these disputes. The timing also matters: with the Asian Cup approaching and Iran needing to field its strongest possible squad, leaving your third-highest scorer out of a continental championship over an Instagram photo would be a hard sell to a fanbase still smarting from the World Cup group-stage exit.
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