The issue between Iran and Nike

Team Melli. No, it has nothing to do with Alessandro Melli, former forward of Parma FC. The Iranian national team has always been called like this, which in the Persian language means "the national team". We heard it too many times, from players, trainers, managers, all over the world, the infamous phrase "football has nothing to do with politics". It might be partially true but it's undeniable that its consequences have always an effect. 

The issue is simple. Right before the kick off of the World Cup, Nike has stopped providing Team Melli's players of the soccer shoes. This is just one of the side effects of Us President Trump's decision to not be part of the nuclear agreement signed in Vienna in 2015 any longer. The deal prevented Iran from developing a technology for nuclear weapons, but it could go on producing nuclear energy for civilian purposes. As a consequence, a series of sanctions were made against Teheran and all the Western companies and banks that had businesses with Iran. This is why for Nike it was impossible to equip the Iranian team, which usually plays with its goods.  

It's also true that Nike could have required a sort of license to the OFAC (Office of Foreign Assets Control), office that belongs to the Us Treasury Department which supervises the implementation and application of the sanctions. There's a long history of concessions and authorizations when it comes to international sports events but with the current Us administration the politic of licenses has abruptly slowed down, to say the least. So it would have been almost impossible for Nike to get such a concession. 

During the press conference before the debut, Queiroz has been very harsh with Nike, that had to justify itself. "The decision is not recent. Nike, since it's an American company, is not allowed to equip the Iranian national team, and it's been like this since 2015. Sanctions have existed ever since, and as every American company, we have to conform to federal laws. Legally we can supply single players when they play in clubs and we have a sponsoring deal: we've always provided them with garments for their belonging teams. The law forbids us, though, to supply them when they play in Iranian teams or in the National team: we've always acted this way".

Actually, Iranian team doesn't have a technical sponsor either. During the matches, the players wear adidas (shorts and tees) but the kit wasn't provided from the German sports giant. The Iranian Federation bought them with a 70% discount and then put the identifying patches on them. A real homemade work. 

Iran qualified for the Russia World Cup easily, without losing a single match during the qualification phase. Iran won the first match against Morocco for 1-0 and last night lost against Spain (Diego Costa scored a goal with the knee in a quite narrow way). Carlos Queiroz has been the coach of the team for 7 years (he used to train Real Madrid) and he was able to achieve a remarkable back to back, qualifying Iran for the 2014 World Cup and then for 2018 one.  Iran will risk its qualification in the third and last match of Group B against the Portugal of Cristiano Ronaldo, 4 goals in 2 matches. Good luck Team Melli.