Taremi off the mark to put Porto back in the winning ways
Mehdi Taremi opened his account for the season as Porto walked away with a 1-0 victory over Estrela da Amadora in the Portuguese Primeira Liga.
Having scored twice in the mid-week 4-0 win against Angola during the international break, the Iranian striker came off the bench to replace injured Evanilson with 15 minutes into the game and found the net on the half-hour mark at the Estádio José Gomes on Friday.
The prolific forward dribbled past home side center-back Miguel Lopes with a delicate touch before his side-footed effort from the edge of the box went in off the post.
This was a fourth victory in five top-flight games for the Dragons, who had been held to a 1-1 draw at home against Arouca last time out.
Having finished as the leading marksman in the league last season, Taremi will hope the strike would end weeks of saga surrounding him, dominated by a likely move to Serie A giant Milan collapsing on the final of the transfer window, as well as hostile comments made by a Sporting TV pundit toward the Iranian for allegedly intending to convince the Portuguese match officials to blow in their whistles for a spot-kick.
Carlos Xavier’s remarks, calling Taremi “a Muslim, who did not even know how to swim when he first arrived in Portugal, but is now a good diver”, came after Porto’s outing against Arouca, in which the referee pointed to the spot after a challenge on the Iranian in the box, only to see his decision overturned by the VAR.
The Iranian Football Federation hit back at the former Sporting CP player for his comments, describing them as “absurd and disgraceful”, while Porto wrote on X, formerly known as Twitter, that his “xenophobic and racist” words were “too serious to go unharmed.”