MY BROMANCE WITH IRANIANS

STAND-UP COMEDIAN AND NON-LEAGUE FAN

- Andy SMART

IN 1998 I was lucky enough to go to the World Cup in France. Nick Hancock and I made a comedy documentary called The Outsiders (available on You Tube).

It was an amazing summer bromance, not with Nick, who I’d known for years, but with a bunch of lads from Iran. We trained with them, played pool with them and laughed a lot with them.

There was: Azizi, whose nickname was Suzuki, because he was so loud, Abedzadeh, the goalkeeper, and leader of the team, Mohammadkhani, the laconic hard man, Ali Daei, the playboy centre-forward, and defensive midfielder, Khakpour, who I helped buy a suit in Le Puy. It was amazing to be a part of their World Cup dreams.

They had lost their opening game against Yugoslavia, 1-0. Their next game was against the USA. This obviously had massive political overtones. The press built up the pressure in the daily interviews.

But I wasn’t going to be in France to watch it. I was going to Tehran with producer and cameraman Adam Bullmore. When we arrived there was a lot of excitement.

Iran is football mad and all 60-odd million Iranians were rooting for the team. The Imams were worried. They banned gatherings of over 12 people.