article_snippet.sent: (CNN)Since Iran's Islamic Revolution in 1979, women have been barred from attending most sports events involving men.
article_snippet.sent: Iranian authorities imposed the ban on women attending men's sports events after the revolution, deeming that mixed crowds watching games together was un-Islamic.
article_snippet.sent: During the ensuing decades, the crowds at soccer games, Iran's most popular sport, have been all male.
article_snippet.sent: Iranian women were briefly permitted to attend volleyball matches under the moderate President Mohammad Khatami, but the ban on women attending men's sports events after the revolution was reinstated in 2005 after the more hard-line Mahmoud Ahmadinejad came to power.
article_snippet.sent: FIFA President Sepp Blatter called on Iran last month to end Iran "intolerable" ban on women attending soccer matches, saying the situation "cannot continue.
article_snippet.sent: Iran had been in the running to host the 2019 edition of soccer's Asian Cup, but the tournament was awarded to the United Arab Emirates.
article_snippet.sent: its "intolerable" ban on women attending soccer matches was widely seen as a major impediment to Iran's chances of securing the event.
article_snippet.sent: its "intolerable" ban on women attending soccer matches came under the spotlight at the Asian Cup in Australia earlier this year, when thousands of female Iranian fans watched thousands of female Iranian fans soccer team without restriction.
article_snippet.sent: During the match against Iraq, activists called for its "intolerable" ban on women attending soccer matches to end and unfurled a banner showing the face of Ghoncheh Ghavami, a British-Iranian woman detained in Iran last year while trying to watch a volleyball match.