Iran coach Saei urges ‘realism’ over poor run at world taekwondo meet
When the dust settled at the 2025 World Taekwondo Championships in Wuxi, China, the performance of Iran’s women’s taekwondo team left many in the country with a sense of missed opportunity.
Under head coach Mahrouz Saei, who assumed the job amid controversy, the results mustered neither the medal haul nor the breakthrough many had anticipated after an impressive Olympic campaign last year.
While Olympic medalists Nahid Kiani (-57kg), and Mobina Nematzadeh (-53kg), as well as Saeideh Nasiri (-46kg), and Melika Mirhosseini (-73kg) failed to go beyond last 16 in their respective classes, Kowsar Asaseh (-62kg) and former world silver medalist Mahla Momenzadeh (-49kg) had their campaigns ended after two bouts, with Nastaran Valizadeh suffering a first-round exit in the -67kg division.
Speaking to Varzesh3 in her first interview after the world event, Saei did not shy away from that reality. She acknowledged the gap between expectation and outcome, but also offered a pointed defense of the circumstances leading into the championships.
“The World Championships are different from all other events – in terms of organization and the competitive atmosphere,” she said. Though she affirmed that “our team was technically, physically and psychologically at the highest possible level,” the key issue, she explained, was that “the team entered the showpiece with no preparatory international tournaments,” a sharp contrast with prior eras.
That contrast is especially instructive given the wider backdrop of Saei’s appointment.
When she was named as the coach earlier in the year, many critics in Iran believed the decision was motivated by nepotism on the part of Saei’s older brother and the chairman of the federation, Hadi Saei, rather than her own coaching credentials.
However, the president of the federation, who had a long-standing feud with former coach Minoo Maddah after the Olympics, insisted that her sister “has the best CV for the job in the country.”
Mahrouz addressed that comparison head-on. “I have been in charge of the national team for about six months,” she said, adding that post-Olympics the team had a very short training cycle. By contrast, she noted, her predecessor had “about three years with the team, and before every competition the national squad had at least three tournaments and three training camps.”
“We had virtually zero warmup tourneys,” she revealed, highlighting canceled trips and a missed Universiade in Germany due to the “12-day war” as critical setbacks.
For all the criticism, Saei remains confident about what lays ahead for the Iranian women’s taekwondo.
She noted that there are more than two years before the next Olympics, and that gives time, but only if the proper foundations are built. “We have three national teams formed: Team A for the World Championships, Team B for Islamic Solidarity Games, and Team C which combines Teams A and B for the World U-21 Championships.” She described this as a sign of organizational renewal, saying, “We certainly have a program for the next Olympics. We will have ups and downs, but our benchmark is the outcome of the training camps and future tournaments. God willing, we will discover and introduce new athletes. And one thing is certain: no athlete will have any security margin regarding their place on the national team.”
Her resolve to continue in the role was clear, though not unconditional: “As long as the federation and the technical committee want me, and I feel I can help the taekwondo community, I will certainly be at the service of the national team and this sport.”
In closing she returned to one of the starkest realities uncovered by the competition: “In the 2022 Worlds in Mexico our girls did not get past the first round and were defeated by a wide margin. The same happened in Baku last year, until Nahid Kiani made a bright showing and won the gold on the final day. In the past 10 years we had only one world medal and one standout athlete in the national team, so let’s just be more realistic about the circumstances.”