North Texas footballer's thrill for 2026 FIFA matches in Arlington layered with familiarity
FLOWER MOUND - Hassan Nazari's path into professional soccer sounds like an accelerated dream with a turbo boost.
The 67-year-old liked another sport more in his native Iran. His older brother was the soccer guy until Nazari got in the game.
"My first sport was volleyball," he said.
However, the volleyball experts in his country did not think he had a future in the sport. So, he started going to his brother's soccer practices and kicking the ball around.
Then, the improbable started to unfold. Nazari said a friend asked him to join a local team because they needed players, and the coach put him in as a forward on the soccer field.
According to Nazari, the team's defender suffered a game-ending injury ten minutes into the game. The coach moved him into that spot, and the rest is history.
With some parental convincing, he joined a regional, state, and professional soccer team in Iran. Nazari said it happened so fast it was too rapid even to ponder.
By 1974, he was watching the World Cups in the stands as a fan. Four years later, he was on the field.
"I played in the Olympics 1976, and then two years later, in 1978, I made it in the World Cup team and I played in the World Cup," he said.
Forty-six years later, he's the founder and president of the Dallas Texas Soccer, involved with youth soccer nationwide, and even had students play in the World Cup as he did.
"I remember when I was a kid, I would just stay in front of the mirror and then practice," he said. "How am I going to react? Am I going to do this? I'm going to do that."
Nazari said he was too young to process the enormity of the prestige and the stage when he was on the field. He does now, so the scale of the World Cup matches coming to Arlington in 2026 is significant in his eye.
"I have to congratulate the Dallas World Cup Committee for bringing nine games to Dallas," he said. "They have done a magnificent job to accomplish that. That's not that's not very easy."
The games are scheduled for June 2026. The event has a strong fan in a player whose life was transformed by soccer.