The East Asian side, the lowest ranked in the tournament, fought hard but was undone by a first-half finish from Mehdi Ghayedi, ending the game at Khalifa International Stadium just one goal behind Iran side ranked 129 places above them.
“I have to repeat what I said before the last game. We played against one of the top teams in Asia. 21st in FIFA rankings, but we did not see the difference between the teams. For that I’m very proud,” said Andersen.
“Football is a team sport, of course they have better players, but as a team, we matched them, we attacked them, and we pushed them. A team like Iran didn’t know how to play their football against us.
“I spoke with the Iran coach before the match and I told him, for me Iran is alongside Japan and Korea (Republic) as top teams, but I see my team as very strong. We created many chances, but we could not take our chances and score.
“Some of our deliveries from corners and set-pieces were not good enough, the deliveries were low at times and we were unable to win the second-balls often,” the Norwegian concluded.