The Sahand Sport Stadium and the main streets of Tabriz were scene of bloody clashes between the fans of Tractor, the South Azerbaijan’s popular football team and the Persian security forces.
Hundreds of Azerbaijani fans stormed into the soccer field and the streets of Tabriz as they learned that the Persian government conspired and engineered the loss of their beloved team.
Reportedly, hundreds of S. Azerbaijani fans were injured and also there are some unconfirmed reports of loss of lives.

On May 15th 2015, the Tractor Football Club was contesting with Tehran’s Naft Club in Iran’s Premiers Leagues. The result was 3-1 in favor of the Tractor until the last 20 minutes of the match.
However, Mr.Faghani, the Persian referee of the match suddenly issued a red card to one of the Tractor’s main players, Mr Timurian and kicked him out of the game for no reason. The referee also ignored a clear penalty situation which lead to result of 3-3.

Surprisingly, in the 87th minute of the match, the stadium’s TV,scoreboard were blacked out and all means of communication including internet and mobile connections were completely cut off. The fans and the two competing teams were left incommunicado. One of the officials of Iran’s Football Federation, in the meantime, went on to gesture that the Sepahan of Esfahan and Saipa of Tehran merely managed a draw of 2-2.
Therefore, Tony Oliviera of Tractor was deceived to instruct his players to pull back and alter their attack strategy with a full defense. The match was ended with the 3-3 result and Mr. Mansourian, the head coach of Tehran’s Naft Clube congratulated the Tractor’s head coach for winning the cup. The fans began celebrating their championship for a few moments. However, as the mobile connections were restored, the fans started to learn about the bitter truth that they were deceived by the officials of Iran’s notoriously racist Football Federation and in fact, the Sepahan of Esfahan had won the match against Saipa, and therefore, the Tractor has dropped to the second place.
Distressed Olievera told media that “Tractor’s cup was in fact stolen” and stated that the referee, Faghani was biased.
The head coach Oliviera is seen distressed among the fans

The cheerful celebrations were suddenly replaced by enormous anger. 90 thousand fans of the Tractor stormed into the pitch and the streets chanting “Stop Persian Racism”, “Down With Islamic Republic”, “Long live Azerbaijan”, etc.
The Islamic Republic’s Flags were set on fire in Tabriz

Mr. Jabbarzadeh, the governor of the Province of Azerbaijan was forced to go on a live TV programming to confess that he was aware of the grave unfairness and discrimination against the Tractor.
He pleaded to the people of Azerbaijan to keep calm and pledged to have a full investigation into the overt injustice against Azerbaijan’s team.
Mansourian the Naft Tehran’s head coach also told media that the last 8 minutes of the match “was the darkest moments of Iran’ football history.” He said that the Iran’s Football Federation “played a very nasty game.”
South Azerbaijani fans called for mass protest demanding a re-play of final match. The scandal even made its way into Iran’s Parliament and Azerbaijani parliamentarians issued a written protest to the minister of Sports demanding an investigation.