Entering his fourth career FIFA World Cup, Iran national team veteran and occasional captain Alireza Jahanbakhsh has given an insight into both his and his teammates’ approach to a tournament being held under unique circumstances.

Since late February, Iran has been at war with the U.S. and Israel, leading to regional instability and geopolitical tensions between the two sides. From a soccer perspective, this conflict has put both the Iranian national team, which qualified for the 2026 U.S., Mexico, and Canadian World Cup back in March 2025, and FIFA, in awkward situations.

After much debating, while Iran’s three group games will still be played on U.S. soil as originally planned, the team is based south of the border in Tijuana at the Centro Xoloitzcuintle. They arrived in Mexico on Sunday, with some, including Jahanbakhsh, wearing "#168" pins, representing the number of children reportedly killed in the Minab school bombing in February.

The team, which will be competing in Group G against Belgium, Egypt, and New Zealand, will then be able to cross the border into the U.S. one day prior to their games, as per a Department of Homeland ⁠Security spokesperson in an interview with Reuters.

With the ongoing conflict between the U.S. and Iran hanging over the tournament, Jahanbakhsh was recently asked for his thoughts on playing Stateside over the coming weeks.

Speaking with ESPN, the FCV Dender EH playmaker said, “Obviously, in every profession you have the organization who is dealing with the whole situation. And with us, with football, it's FIFA. And the symbol of FIFA is FIFA, let's say, Football Uniting the World.

“And this is also, I would say, the way we look at it in a way that we are here, of course, to play football, to enjoy the game.

“I mean, this is a beautiful game that can bring people together and nations, different colors, different cultures. And this is what we feel the responsibility as well, as Iranian, as Persian people, I would say.

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“And we want to give a good impression to the world that we are here to be, let's say, to call for the peace, call to be united. At the end of the day, we are all humans. And we do different things. And we have different cultures. We have different colors.

“But at the end of the day, we are all human. And we have to make sure that outside of football, things are in a good order.”

Jahanbakhsh went on to say that their focus is soccer, rather than weighing in on situations that they may not have “much knowledge about.”

That being said, he emphasized that “as the Iranian national team, we are here to give a good impression in the sense of, let's say, like I said, we are peaceful people.

“We have a very rich history. We have a very, let's say, pure culture. And that's what we try to do. And I mean, maybe there are things happening all around. But this is the most important thing that we've been all over the years, wherever we played with the national team, different tournaments, different countries.

“Now, yeah, because of the situations in the U.S. as well. So the goal is the same. The situation is the same for us. And most importantly, like I said, that we go out there to play some football.”

As for his and his colleagues’ safety, something U.S. President Donald Trump previously cited as a concern, Jahanbakhsh said he was not worried, stating that he was confident in FIFA’s ability to handle that element of the situation.

“FIFA is responsible for all the teams who are participating in the World Cup. So now it's in the U.S. It could have been in a different country. And still, the FIFA and the organization is responsible to make sure that the safety is there for players, for everybody who's involved in that tournament,” he said.

“So in that sense, I’m personally not. I don't think the group has that feeling as well in a sense of safety or that sort of situation.”

However, the 32-year-old acknowledged that there is no knowing what “circumstances” might come their way, although he said that they were “ready” regardless.

“That's something we keep repeating within the group as well, because we have a lot of young players,” he explained. “We have new faces in the group as well that haven't been in the situation.

“So they might be a little bit shocked if they come across certain things that might happen. But I personally think that the group is ready for facing different circumstances in upcoming weeks.”

Iran’s tournament is set to begin on Monday, June 15, at SoFi Stadium in Inglewood, California, where they will take on New Zealand.

Source: Alloutsoccer.com