2-1.
The whole place came back from the dead, the red end up as one. Behind me the big fan was on his feet, the flag off his neck, leaning right over me. "NOW! Now you cry, English!"
The lads' heads came round to me, all of them. I clapped once, hard, two fingers up and then one, the shape we'd drilled, and pressed both palms at the air. Tighten. Hold.
The fourth official, a neat, busy man who owned the strip of grass between the two dugouts, put a hand up at me, and I stepped back into my box.
He lifted his board a minute later, a red number off and a green one on, and Bouhaddouz came on for En-Nesyri. The kid came off soaked through, both arms up to the green corner.
They held. El Ahmadi sat in front of the back four and took the heat out of it a safe pass at a time, and slowly the red came off the boil.
Eighty-two minutes. Iran won a corner and sent everyone up but their keeper, eight red shirts in our box.
