shiraz321

I think Zare has been Iran's best gold hope for a while. In fact it was interesting to read that even going back to the Tokyo Olympics the coaches considered him the best chance for gold out of the entire Iranian wrestling team, freestyle and greco. He'd never even made a world team at that point. He just doesn't seem able to win the gold in back to back years.

Not sure. Thought it was last UWW tournament. Maybe someone can enlighten us.

I think the rule is you need to sit out 2 years from the last date you represented your original country internationally, which for Masoumi would be the 2025 Asian championships. But i'm not a 100% sure on that.

Well it seems there is at least some possibility of him going to Armenia. Very surprising. Maybe they recently increased funding for their wrestling program because I would think there are far more lucrative offers from other countries.

Does Armenia even recruit foreign wrestlers? Off the top of my head all their guys are home grown. I don't think they pay their medalists well either. I would guess Masoumi will wrestle for another country, but I don't think it will be Armenia.

That's from asian champs last month

Yones Emami beats Yazdani 4 - 3 to make the world team.

Yes, Hassan Yazdani is technically correct. Cherat is a place in Mazandaran that I believe his parents or grandparents are from and it would not really be used when referring to him in Iran. But I do think it's cool that @Husker_Du calls him Cherati, lol.

We will see. From interviews I have read it seems the coaches more convinced him to come to 86 while he would have preferred to stay at 92.

He made a lot of progress. He was second in Asian juniors last year and won asian seniors this year. He is on an upward path. I think we will see him at junior worlds again in a few months. 86 this year depends a lot on how Ghasempour looks after actually making 86kg.

They weighed around 89kg I think.

Ghasempour beats Rahmani 3‌- 1 and makes the world team at 86kg. A good match. It had a weight allowance, though.

It was two stories. He deleted them.

Yes, you are wrong, lol. They don't transfer nearly as much as Russians, but it does happen. We had a HW greco guy wrestling for Azerbaijan. He won them an olympic bronze in 2016 if I remember right without googling. Another GR guy is wrestling for Qatar or Bahrain at the moment and another for Serbia. Masoumi is posting angry stories on his instagram. I think he will switch countries in the coming years. 57 - Momeni def Valizadeh 9 - 4 61 - Uulu ( Kyrgzstan) def Reza Momeni 4 - 3 65 - Indian dude spoken about previously def Yasin Rezaei 11 - 11 criteria 70 - Abdulkadyrov ( Russia) def Mohamad Amouzad by pin 74 - Yazdani def Emami 7 - 4 79 - Babai def Yousefi 5 - 3 86 - Rahmani def Kavousi 7 - 1 92 - Azimi def Sorabi 5 - 2 97 - Bazri def Babaloo 3 - 1 125 - Zare def Masoumi 8 - 2 A lot of names were missing even though everyone was meant to compete here. Some of the weight classes were pointless as the world team member had already been selected. This was supposed to be a very important step in the selection process with everyone competing but that did not happen in the end. I think only Zare and Momeni at 57 are guaranteed the world team spot based off this tournament. So the 2025 world team so far for Iran is 57 - Momeni 61 - Javan 65 - Amouzad 70 - Undecided 74 - Undecided between Yazdani and Emami 79 - Undecided between Nokhodi and Babai 86 - Undecided - I will assume they will send Rahmani and Ghasempour to a tournament somewhere 92 - Firouzpour 97 - Bazri will need to somehow make the team over Azarpira. I don't see it happening. I guess they will send them to a tournament. Or just send Bazri to a tournament on his own and if he does not win they send Azarpira automatically. 125 - Zare

I wonder if Masoumi will switch country.

Reza Atri is still alive? News to me. He is old. No way he can do anything at 57 internationally. If he was he would have done it by now. Did he even try and make the Paris Olympic team? He is from the same generation as Yazdani, Karimi, Taheri and Iman Sadeghi. Karimi is the most underrated Iranian wrestler of all time, btw.

Firstly I would like to say I always appreciate your posts. You are very knowledgeable and they are always interesting. Of course they are both unpopular sports, I just assumed GR having no female divisions AND being unpopular would push it over the edge. Also wrestling is the only combat sport to have multiple styles, and we have to most weight classes of any sport that has weight classes in the games. Tae Kwon Do has 8, Weightlifting has 10, Judo has 15, Boxing has 14 and we have 18. Your point about it surviving off legacy must be accurate. I wonder how much longer it can go.

12 weights is over kill. 9 or 10 is good. Maybe keep them the same but get rid of 92 and adjust 86 and 97 accordingly. As for GR, credit to UWW. No clue how a unpopular sport with no women's division continues to survive in the olympics. The only sport in the games that women can not participate in. I'd be interested if anyone can shed some light on this. Unfortunately I think that if/when it finally does get cut, the weights wont go to FS, but to beach wrestling.

57 - No clue. I don't expect much from whoever emerges at worlds. Seems Momeni is the front runner. 61- Javan selected 65 - Amouzad selected. Emrahimzadeh seems to be the best of the rest and will probably go to U23 worlds again. 70 - Sina Khalili, but I am interested to see him wrestle Shakeri. 74 - Emami is still probably the best guy we have. 79 - Yousefi 86- Ghasempour, but I am interested in seeing Rahmani. He is very talented and improving rapidly. 92 - Firouzpour selected and Azimi at 97. Who is even left at this weight? 97 - Probably still Goleij 125 - Zare, but hopefully Masoumi

May 6th

He called him a traitor and Gazyumov ( AZE head coach and 2016 olympic silver) got into it with Mamiashvili afterwards apparently.

That was 9 years ago

https://iwf.ir/?th=contentdetail&PageCode=78838

Azarpira won't be at the Takhti. Whoever wins the Takhti at 97 will go to some tournaments (without Azarpira) and if they are "successful" in those tournaments they can go to a foreign tournament with Azarpira or directly wrestle him for a spot on the team based off what the coaches decide. In the wrestle off they would need to beat him twice but he would only need to beat them once. And yes, I think it is unfair to Masoumi. They should let him go to worlds if he wins Takhti, especially since Zare will be at the Takhti anyway, but that is not the path they want to go. Zare seems to choke/lose every other year and Masoumi seems about as good against foreign competition but as is always the case in Iran world medalists are protected until the bitter end. They are even protecting Younes Emami of all people.

They announced the trials procedure for the rest of the year now that the Asian champs and other recent tournaments have concluded. Amouzad at 65 and Firouzpur at 92 are confirmed 2025 world team members with no further trial or foreign tournament. They are on the team. With the news of Firouzpour being the world team member I think it confirms we wont see Yazdani return this year. Some other guys like Ghasempour at 86 and Zare at 125 just need to win the Takhti cup to be on the team. So if Masoumi wins the Takhti even with Zare being in the bracket he would still need to beat him in a separate trial or outperform him in a foreign tournament. I heard from a good source Masoumi will wrestle for another country if he doesn't make the team very soon.