For the Iranian women’s football team, the stakes are higher than ever
For the Iranian women’s football team, the stakes are higher than ever
Abigail BuchananSun, March 8, 2026 at 8:00 AM UTC
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In a press conference, Sara Didar was fighting back the tears when asked about the war - Dave Hunt/EPA/Shutterstock
At the time of its adoption in 1990, the national anthem of the Islamic Republic of Iran was the second shortest in the world, lasting roughly a minute. Earlier this week, the Iranian women’s national football team proved just how powerful that minute could be – by standing silently on the pitch as it played.
Iran’s women’s national team had arrived in Australia for the Asian Cup just days before war broke out in their home country and its long-term supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, was killed in a US-Israeli air strike.
The Asian Cup is not usually a high-profile tournament, but a video clip of the Iranian players standing silent rather than singing along with the anthem of the Iranian regime made headlines around the world. It has made the women in it – who typically keep a low profile – unexpected symbols of the resistance.
Their silence on Monday has left a vacuum which has been filled with fevered speculation. Was this a silent protest, an act of defiance or even, as some online commentators have suggested, actually an act of mourning? Due to the team’s near-total media lockdown, it is impossible to know for sure.
Credit: X/@Tarikh_Eran
One thing is clear: if it was a protest, it was a courageous one indeed. They have been dubbed the “Iranian Lionesses” for their bravery – not only in appearing to silently protest during the national anthem, but in showing up to play when war is raging in their homeland and widespread telephone and internet blackouts mean they are unlikely to be able to regularly contact their friends and family. At least 1,230 people are thought to have died in Iran since the conflict began a week ago, including dozens of children killed in a strike on Shajare Tayyebe school in Minab, near the southern coast, last Saturday.
All this while grappling with the restrictions placed on female athletes in Iran, who need permission from a male guardian to travel. In Australia, it has been reported that security guards closely watch players every move and they’re not allowed to use their phones or move around freely.
By their second fixture against Australia on Thursday, the players had done an about-turn, singing and saluting as the national anthem was played, leading many to speculate that they were threatened or pressured into doing so. It is possible – even probable – that the players were under pressure from the Iranian regime to comply, according to Iranian journalist Nazenin Ansari, who edits Kayhan London, a weekly Persian-language newspaper based in London that has been critical of the Iranian regime.
“They would have been either pressured or wary of the consequences,” she says. “There is a precedent.” In 2023, an Iranian midfielder named Reza Shekari was suspended from his team after refusing to celebrate a win out of respect for the Iranian people mourning the loss of loved ones killed in widespread anti-government protests at the time. Iranian sportswomen have faced countless other challenges, Ansari points out, including being penalised or banned from competing for not wearing a hijab (headscarf).
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Alireza Mohebbi, an Australia-based correspondent for Iran International TV, said there was “no doubt” the players had subsequently been forced to sing. “It’s completely obvious that the Islamic Republic’s regime, and the security team which is with the players in Australia, forced them to sing and do the military salute,” he said. The backlash to Monday’s silence has been swift: in a clip that has been shared widely online, a conservative presenter of an Iranian state media channel called the women “wartime traitors” responsible for a “shameless betrayal”.
“The silence during the first anthem – a powerful act of civil disobedience – is what counts,” says Iranian human rights campaigner Maryam Namazie. “Iranian athletes know the consequences of such dissent on an international stage. And when it is women who do this, it carries even greater meaning.”
A fan at Iran’s game with Australia had a sign showing support for their decision to stay silent - Dave Hunt/EPA/Shutterstock
It could also put them in great danger. Activism and government opposition can be severely punished in Iran, and “treason” is a capital offense punishable by death. “They could face arrest, imprisonment, or worse [when they return home], as the war has further intensified security measures and repression,” says Namazie. “Monday’s moment of silence reflects the deeper reality of [life in] Iran: a society resisting both dictatorship at home and war from outside. The fact they later sang does not erase that moment; it shows the pressure they were placed under.”
Understandably, the players have shied away from the press throughout the tournament, only appearing when strictly necessary at mandatory press conferences, where the questions – and their responses – appear to be tightly controlled. Other media requests for interviews have been declined, and information about the team’s training sessions has been removed from the official tournament schedule.
At one such conference on Wednesday, 21-year-old striker Sara Didar appeared to be fighting back tears as she said: “Obviously we are all concerned and sad at what has happened to Iran, and our families in Iran, and our loved ones. But I really hope it’s very good for our country, to have good news ahead.”
In any case, it is a miracle the women have made it to the pitch at all. Earlier in the year, Zahra Azadpour, a footballer for Mehrgan Pardic Women FC, was killed by Islamic Republic forces during a protest in Karaj near Tehran in January aged just 27. Iran’s goalkeeper Zahra Khajavi, also 27, had also publicly supported the protests, saying in December last year, according to a translation, that the Iranian people should not be punished with “poverty and empty tables”.
Meanwhile, as anti-government demonstrations escalated, two players had already withdrawn from the national team: Zahra Alizadeh and Kowsar Kamali, who said in a now-deleted Instagram post that she can’t “pretend everything is normal”. “When the heart is wounded and the soul is tired, football is no longer a refuge,” she wrote.
Historically, women’s football in Iran has faced extinction on multiple occasions. The sport was abandoned completely at the time of the Iranian revolution in 1979 and was only refounded in 2004. Then, in 2011, Iran were banned by FIFA from competing internationally due to the fact they wear hijabs. They were reinstated in 2012. In 2015, they were embroiled in a gender scandal when it was widely reported that many of the players on the team were actually men apparently awaiting gender reassignment surgery.
As the women of Iran take to the pitch today for their final fixture against the Philippines, they will be well aware the stakes are higher than they’ve ever been. Whether they sing along or not, they’ve made their stand.
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Source: “AOL Breaking”
