Amir Qalenoui in a training session. (photo by Naeem Ahmadi)

Esteqlal’s head coach Amir Qalenoui believes that after clinching the Iran Cup his side is capable enough to take Iran Premiere League (IPL) Cup and perform equally well in the Asian Champions League (ACL). Tehran’s Blue supporters are certain that Qalenoui’s victories in recent years will help them grab another cup. Iran Daily’s Sadeq Dehqan in a telephone interview asked the senior trainer about his plans for the next season.

Esteqlal didn’t perform well in the last season. How do you see your boys in the coming season?
Esteqlal is a big club. We couldn’t get good results in IPL last season. By clinching the Iran Cup, I think we have a new vision for the next season. We are in a good condition both in spirit and physically. Everyone in the club, eyes IPL, Iran Cup and also ACL.

In the crowded transfer market your side performed well. Don’t you think having concentrated on one area could harm your team’s performance?
We took new players to remove our weaknesses. In midfield (defensive midfield), right wing new players have joined us. This season we will have close to 50 games including IPL, Iran Cup and ACL.

In the past Esteqlal performed well in ACL. Do you really believe you can win the Cup again?
I think our team this season is in shape and do its best. But one shouldn’t forget that football is unpredictable.

As you know Iran Football Federation (IFF) wants to have the Super League game between Esteqlal and Persepolis. You have never lost to Persepolis in all the past clashes. What is your opinion if this game is okayed?
I think it’s a good idea. The game could be a good preparatory event for both sides. Such games are normally played amid a high level of tension. I believe such tournaments can help reduce the tensions. Moreover they are in the interest of Iranian football.

Luiz Felipe Scolari

Luiz Felipe Scolari on Tuesday played down reports linking Chelsea with a world record transfer bid for AC Milan star Kaka.
Scolari has been reported to have told Chelsea to make the Brazil playmaker the club’s top transfer target after taking charge at Stamford Bridge.
The former Brazil coach gave Kaka his national team debut and Chelsea owner Roman Abramovich is a confirmed admirer of the player, leading to suggestions he was ready to make an offer of over 50 million ($98.5 million), AFP reported.
But Scolari was quick to distance himself from Kaka or any of the other big names, including Ronaldinho and Liverpool striker Fernando Torres, who have also been linked with the Blues.
For Scolari it is the time of year when every Tom, Dick and Harry or Kaka, Pedro and Paolo in his case is mooted to be a target for big clubs.
“Everyone knows it is time for speculation. It could be Kaka, Ambroso, Pedro or Paolo! Now is the time for that,“ he said.
Scolari praises teamwork above individual talent and insists he will make it clear which players he wants to fit into that ethos, even if the final financial verdict will be given by Abramovich.
“I want a team. If we win it is as a team, not one player alone. It is not an individual exercise,“ Scolari said. “The technical side of the decision is mine; the financial decision is not mine.“

Gregory Coupet

Atletico Madrid’s new 35-year-old goalkeeper, Gregory Coupet, said Tuesday that he hopes to still be part of France’s squad during the 2010 World Cup as he was officially unveiled by the Spanish club.
Asked if he intended to be France’s keeper at the tournament in South Africa, he said: “Playing for Atletico and the possibility of playing in the Champions League allow me to continue to think, to dream of the French squad.“
According to AFP, Coupet, who had been linked to the English League Cup winners Tottenham, said he had come to Spain “to try to show that I have a place in the starting line-up to defend“.
Atletico signed Coupet for the next two seasons. He represented France at Euro 2008 and has been capped 34 times.
The Spanish side are in the qualifying round of the Champions League after finishing fourth in the Primera Liga last season.
Coupet had a clause in his Lyon contract running to 2010 allowing him to leave Lyon, with whom he has won seven straight league titles, for three million euros, but the Spanish side finally got their man for half that.
Atletico will pay an extra 500,000 euros if Coupet helps them qualify for the Champions League in the next two seasons.

Karl-Heinz Rummenigge

European soccer’s governing body UEFA is considering changing the name of its second tier UEFA Cup competition to the UEFA Europa League.
The planned re-branding was revealed by Karl-Heinz Rummenigge, the acting chairman of the new European Clubs Association, whose organization was presented with the proposal on Monday.
“The hope is that a refreshment of the name and brand can help achieve better results than we’ve seen in the UEFA Cup in the past,“ Rummenigge later told a media conference at UEFA’s Swiss headquarters.
“There has been a general impression that it has become a second-class competition and that we should get back to how it was 10 or 15 years ago.“
A senior UEFA source confirmed to Reuters that UEFA’s executive committee would vote on the name change in its next meeting in Bordeaux in September.
He said the new name was meant to better reflect the new group stage system being used in the competition from the 2009-10 season, in a direct copy of UEFA’s much more successful Champions League competition.
UEFA announced in December that it was revamping the UEFA Cup’s format, dropping the unpopular five-team groups in which teams play each opponent just once either home or away in favor of a simpler home and away system.
From 2009 UEFA will also be marketing the competition centrally, in another lesson learned from the lucrative Champions League and hopes that the new name will help distinguish it from the previous UEFA Cup format.