Morocco vs Iran - Preview and possible lineups

Morocco:

The 'Atlas Lions' will be hoping that Monaco winger Nabil Dirar is fit to start. The star man has missed the last two friendlies with a calf injury, so is a clear doubt, however he is back in training and it is possible that he could feature on Friday.

Iran:

Iran will be without Saeid Ezatolahi, who is suspended. There are also question marks over Mehdi Taremi and Askhan Dejagah, who are both lacking fitness.

Morocco boss Herve Renard:

Renard will go into all three of his side's group stage games with the same approach. "We have three teams who are above us in the FIFA rankings," he said in his pre-match conference. "We will treat all three of these games the same and prepare in the same way."

He praised Friday's opponents, but said that every side has its weakness. "Iran have some very strong midfielders and three world class forwards, who have a lot of pace," he stated. "But Iran, like all the other teams in these moments, have some weak spots."

"Carlos Quieroz always has a surprise, but we've been watching Iran's games for six months. We will see tomorrow who is the most concentrated and the readiest."

Iran boss Carlos Quieroz:

Quieroz says that his side are the underdogs in the group, but refused to allow people to rule Iran out. "We admit that the three other teams are the favourites, with their big players at big clubs," he claimed. "But we will not let people say that we can't win. We don't accept people reducing our hopes to nothing."

He also made it clear he has no problem with putting in a defensive display. "Iran aren't different to other teams that sometimes have to defend for 90 minutes against the big sides," he said. "If we have to defend 90 minutes for a result, we will do it, no problem."

Did you know?

Iran and Morocco have never met at the World Cup. Morocco have never got further than round of 16 in the tournament (1986), while Iran haven't even got past the group stage.

Morocco are currently on a run of 18 games unbeaten, a vein of form that is only bested by Belgium (19) and Spain (20) going into Russia 2018.

Possible lineups:

Morocco: El Kajoui; Mendyl, Saiss, Benatia, Hakimi; Ziyech, Boussoufa, Belhanda, El Ahmadi, Amrabat; Boutaib

Iran: Beiranvand; Mohammadi, Pouraliganji, Cheshmi, Montazeri; Shojaei, Haji Safi, Ebrahimi; Amiri, Azmoun, Jahanbakhs