Victories this month over Hong Kong, Bahrain, and Cambodia had seen Iran come from well off the pace in Group C to go into the final set of fixtures with their fate in their own hands.

A win over Iraq would send them through as group winners and that is exactly what they achieved; Sardar Azmoun scoring the only goal at the Sheikh Ali bin Mohammed Al Khalifa Stadium after 35 minutes.

Saman came off the bench for the final 12 minutes to earn his fourth cap of the month and 26th in total for his nation.

The draw for that Third Round will be made on 1 July. The 12 qualified teams have been seeded in six pots with one team from each pot put into the two groups. They then play each other home and away before the top two from each pot qualify automatically for Qatar 2022. The two third-placed teams will then Play-Off before facing a further Play-Off round against a qualifier from another confederation for a spot at the World cup.

Today's international action is back at Euro 2020 with Marcus Forss and Halil Dervişoğlu set to be involved. Marcus and Finland can effectively guarantee a spot in the Round of 16 with victory over Russia while Halil's Turkey will be looking to bounce back after their opening day defeat to Italy.