Iran = The Oregon Ducks (Football)

Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini. According to official Iranian government
records, he is the national team's all-time leading scorer.

Nike CEO Phil Knight, the Supreme Leader of Oregon athletics.

Credit goes to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu for being the first to notice the connection between Iran and the Ducks:

The Oregon Ducks don't have nuclear weapons (that we know of), but they did spark an "arms race" in college sports, thanks to the gazillions of dollars that Nike CEO Phil Knight has donated to their athletic programs in the last 2 decades. "Uncle Phil's" fortune built various new facilities and amenities for Oregon football and basketball players that gave the Ducks a recruiting advantage over other teams. Those teams, in turn, built their own new weight rooms, locker rooms, video game systems, waterfalls, etc. Then Uncle Phil gave the Ducks more shiny new toys. Lather, rinse, repeat.

Oregon and Nike (which are really one and the same) are also responsible for the "proliferation" of horrible uniforms that has taken over college sports. Dozens of teams have adopted garish, gimmicky designs, and/or dumped their traditional colors for black or silver (or some variant thereof), and/or been forced to change their names for no reason (GRRRRRRRR!!!!!!). We have the Ducks' constantly shifting wardrobes to thank for all of it.

Doesn't making 100 new uniforms every week go against the environmentalist / sustainability values that the Pacific Northwest is known for?

Yes Duck fans, you're right, what I think doesn't matter. Players like the uniforms, and a great many have chosen to play for Oregon at least in part because of them. Give the Devil its due. Oregon and Nike found a creative way to exploit a loophole in the NCAA's system of bullshit amateurism to acquire a competitive advantage. Bravo. That doesn't mean I have to like the abominations you have inspired across the country.

Anyway, getting back to the World Cup, Iran resembles the hapless Oregon football teams of the 70s and 80s as opposed to the Nike-fueled juggernaut of recent vintage. The "Princes of Persia" (yes, that is one of their official nicknames) are one of the weakest teams in the field. They already surpassed many people's expectations for this tournament by nicking a point from Nigeria in their first game. Midfielder and Captain Javad Nekounam played with Osasuna (more or less the Buffalo Bills of La Liga, who were relegated after the just-concluded season) in Spain from 2006 to 2012. Midfielder Ashkan Dejagah has played for top division teams in Germany and England for the last 10 years (although his Fulham team was just relegated). Defender Steven Beitashour was born and grew up in San Jose, California, the son of Iranian-American immigrants, and plays in MLS. (Beitashour was called up by the US team once for a friendly in 2012 but did not play. More than a year later, he accepted his first call-up for Iran, at the age of 26. It does not appear that the US was ever terribly interested in him.) Other than that, their squad is a lot of largely anonymous jobbers who mostly toil in very low level leagues. Under former Portugal manager Carlos Queiroz, they play a system that consists of parking every bus in Persia in front of their own net and sucking the life out of games. It worked against Nigeria, but Argentina (and then Bosnia) will present a much more formidable challenge.