Iran's four places in the Asian Champions League are not guaranteed in the future due to a number of issues facing the domestic game, according to the Asian Football Confederation.

The AFC's Special Mission Team is currently on an inspection visit of Iran following on from a similar trip last year which raised several issues which needed to be improved upon if Iran's Pro League was to maintain its four places in the ACL.
AFC director of competition and professional football projects Tokuaki Suzuki told a press conference on Monday the SMT would hope to see improvements in facilities, group flow and match attendance counts.
“There will be a couple of things which are Iran's weak points. Most of all, we will re-assess the facility part and I look forward to seeing any improvements in this aspect,” Suzuki said.
“Secondly, we will check the flows of the respective groups such as players, officials, media, fans and VIP.
“Thirdly, it seems that Iran still can't produce an accurate figure for match attendances. We will see how the clubs are doing the attendance counts.
“This inspection by the SMT will be very critical for Iranian football since Iran shall fail to meet the criteria if any of the items does not meet the criteria set by the AFC.
“Therefore, I would like to stress the significance for the clubs, league and federation to meet the criteria.”
Iran Pro League president Aziz Mohammadi said the nation had made progress since the 2010 visit.
“However, there would be still a few criteria which we may not meet and we would be happy to follow up on them and finally meet all the criteria set by the AFC,” Mohammadi said.
Suzuki said he had been impressed by Iran's 2011 ACL competitors with two clubs, Sepahan and Zob Ahan, qualifying for the Last 16.
(Source: Goal)