When England line up against Iran in Doha today, the VIP seats should be studded with former players from both sides. But one who almost certainly won’t be present is a player with a solid claim to having been the greatest Iranian footballer in history. Because Ali Karimi is a wanted man.
The 44-year-old is hugely influential in Iran – he has 13 million social media followers there. But he has positioned himself as such an overt critic of the country’s regime that he’s now living in exile, threatened with arrest – and worse – should he return to or be forcibly taken back to Iran.
An equivalent situation here might involve one of those twin politically-minded Garys, Neville and Lineker, going fully revolutionary to lead a popular insurrection and threatened with death. So how did he get here?
Karimi was an extraordinarily exciting player, so much so that he was nicknamed ‘The Asian Maradona’ – and ‘The Magician’. Whereas Ali Daei, his near contemporary and main rival for the title of greatest ever Iranian player, was a powerhouse of a striker – strong, direct, good in the air – Karim was much more silky and skilful, a scimitar rather than a broadsword, and consequently a lot more fun to watch.
If you seek out Karimi’s many showreels on YouTube you will see how apposite that Maradona tag was: he has almost the same fluency with the ball that the Argentinian had in his 1980s pomp – it sticks to his foot – and the same desire to dribble around defenders again and again. With his hair long, sweeping behind him as he darts one way or another, he is as visually flamboyant in his playing style as you can get.
Karimi started out as a teenager with a lowly local village side, Fath, in the country’s second division, which had no training pitches and reputedly only plastic balls to practise with. He was instantly the team’s standout player and rapidly moved on to better things, joining the country’s then biggest team, Persepolis, in the capital, Tehran. There crowds of 100,000 were not unheard of – and national league titles and cups were the goal. Karimi won both in his first season and the championship again in his second.
Iran doesn’t have the same established route to global football superstardom as the favelas of Rio or Wallsend Boys Club in Newcastle. But Karimi was scoring so many goals – and so many exciting goals – that European clubs, among them Atletico Madrid, began to court him.
He initially stayed close to home, moving to the UAE to join Al Alhi in 2001. Twenty years on he was voted the best foreign player ever to play in the country. It was only in 2005 that he finally moved to Europe, joining Bayern Munich to play in the Bundesliga and Champions League. Karimi was an instant hit, scoring goals and notching up assists and man of the match awards – and getting picked enough to trigger a contract extension.
But the latter part of that first season in Munich and much of his second was blighted by persistent injury. That injury also undermined his performances at the only world cup Iran qualified for during his career: the 2006 tournament, also in Germany. They lost their opening two group games, to Mexico and Portugal, and when he was substituted off in the latter match Karimi kicked out at some kit bags in frustration. He was dropped for their final game as punishment.
This was a nadir in an otherwise glittering international career in which he won a gold medal in the 1998 Asian Games, scoring in the final, finish top scorer in the 2004 Asian Cup and be named Asian player of the year in the same season. He would go on to play for Iran 127 times, the third highest tally ever, and to captain the team. He left Munich to rebuild his club career after that horror 2006 season, going to Qatar, where he remains revered, and Iran again.
There had already been signs during the later stages of his playing days that he was not exactly awed by authority. In 2008 it took an intervention from a grandson of Ayatollah Khomeini to get him back into the national team after he was dropped for criticising the country’s football authorities.
His next row was more overtly political: in 2009 he was one of a number of players who wore green wristbands in what was seen as a gesture of support for an opposition leader –leading to a life ban for playing for Iran which was only rescinded when Fifa intervened.
Karimi finally retired in 2013 and went into management, briefly as assistant for the national team, and at two Iranian club sides. But it’s lately, just this autumn, as a central opposition figure that he has achieved enormous fame in Iran a second time around.
As Ben Charedi, a London-based Iranian football figure, said recently: ‘Karimi’s massive popularity among Iran’s youths is more to do with his political views rather than his outstanding sportsmanship. He has never bowed to the regime.’
The pivotal point was the national and international outcry following the death of 22-year-old Mahsa Amini in September – after she was arrested and beaten by Iranian morality police for not being properly veiled.
Karimi, from his base in Dubai, quickly became one of the most prominent voices condemning her murder, posting a series of anti-government messages. He publicly supported the series of angry protests at which 15,000 were arrested and 326 or more killed. He wrote that ‘not even holy water could wash away the stain’ of Amini’s death, and gave advice on how to bypass internet censorship. Urging the army to defy orders, he wrote: ‘A homeland is waiting for you. Do not let innocent blood be shed.’ He also wrote of high-ranking officials: ‘Their children leave [Iran]; our children die.’
The response has been brutal. Karimi has been charged in absentia with encouraging riots – or ‘collusion with the intention of acting against national security’ – and a warrant has been issued for his arrest. Property he owns in the country has been seized and he’s been disparaged as a ‘rabble-rouser’ by those loyal to the regime who demand he face severe punishment. He has had multiple death threats.
But it didn’t end there. Last month there were claims of an attempt to kidnap him and forcibly repatriate him to Iran. He was reportedly lured to meet a prominent Iranian in the Emirati port city of Fujairah, in the belief the man wanted advice on how to defect, before learning at the last minute that it was a trap to abduct him and force him to record a confession to air on state television.
‘I thank my countrymen who are worried about my humble self,’ Karimi wrote. ‘I and my family have been threatened and are threatened in various ways. But I am not important. I still mourn my countrymen across Iran and all my pain and sorrow is the safety of the people in my homeland.’
And from Karimi, dissent is spreading. Just days after this, that rival for the ‘greatest Iranian player’ honour Ali Daei – second only to Cristiano Ronaldo as all-time leading international scorer, with 109 goals – announced that he would be staying away from Qatar in solidarity with Iranians who died during the Mahsa Amini protests. Daei’s announcement was a shock as he had been involved in promoting the tournament as recently as April. The current team captain, Alireza Jahanbakhsh, posted a picture of a woman raising her arms with doves – although it was soon taken down.
It might be that these interventions in Iranian politics ultimately provide a legacy more significant than anything Karimi and other current and former players ever achieve on a football pitch. We should certainly be cheering for them.
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