In Iran, football is everything. It’s noise, emotion, pride; the kind of thing that connects everyone, no matter where they’re from. But for women, the gates to the stadium have always been closed. Watching the game from behind screens or outside the fences has been their only option for years.

In 2018, under pressure from FIFA and waves of social media protests, a small group of women were finally let into Tehran’s Azadi Stadium. For a moment, it felt like history. Like maybe something was changing. But it didn’t last. A few months later, conservative officials reversed the decision, and the ban came back just as quietly as it had been lifted.

Still, women found ways in. They cut their hair short, borrowed their brothers’ clothes, glued on fake beards. anything to stand among the crowd and feel the pulse of the game.

Photographer Forough Alaei was one of them. She disguised herself as a man to document the women who refused to accept the ban, capturing rare glimpses of defiance, fear, and joy. Her series, later awarded a World Press Photo prize, goes beyond football. It’s a story about belonging, about how far people will go just to be seen, and about women who won’t wait for permission to take up space.