The public party was one of a cascade of new images from Iran during the World Cup, beginning with the fair-play of Iran's team beating the United States on the field after decades of orchestrated demonstrations shouting slogans at the ``Great Satan''. The slogans were noticeably absent during the night's celebrations, according to witnesses, replaced instead by spontaneous shouts of victory for the nationalteam. The match-up between the two old enemies, though due entirely to the luck-of-the-draw, came as moderate President Mohammad Khatami has called for opening a break in the ``Wall of Mistrust'' between Teheran and Washington by encouraging sporting and cultural exchanges. The enthusiastic public reaction to the game, and Iran's victory, gave Khatami's polices a powerful endorsement just a little over a year after he swept into power on a platform of change with 70 pc of the vote.

Khatami, who followed the match live on television, called it ``a victory for national unity for all Iranians, whatever their political opinions.'' Iran's victory in its first World Cup tournament in 20 years was heavy with political significance as Iran and the United States size each other up for a possible rapprochement after two decades of mistrust. Washington, which has had no diplomatic relations with Teheran since 1980, offered last week to discuss a ``road-map leading to normal relations''. Iran welcomed the US offer butsaid it is awaiting a concrete gesture. Yet, if crowds overnight seemed determined to give a new image to Iran, as Khatami has called for, there were signs by morning that Iran's conservative wing remains strongly opposed to opening the country too much to the West. Freshly written slogans of ``Marg Bar Amrica'' (Death to America) appeared on walls downtown and in the northern suburbs at dawn even as conservative leaders stressed that officially Washington is still enemy number one.

Iran's supreme spiritual guide Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said in a televised message after the game that ``the players gave a beautiful image of the Iranian people, who know how to win on all fronts.''He added: ``Once more the oppressor has tasted the bitterness of defeat.'' Former Iranian President Akbar Hashemi-Rafsanjani said on Monday he did not believe the United States was sincere in its offer to work towards restoring ties after 18 years of hostility. ``We doubt Washington's sincerity,'' said Rafsanjani, who remains apowerful figure in the Islamic republic, the official IRNA news agency reported.

The regime's reformists and conservatives are locked in a bitter political battle which saw reformist interior minister Abdollah Nuri ousted Sunday after a censure motion in the conservative-dominated Parliament. But a defiant Khatami insisted after the vote that he would not change his policies despite the ousting of his interior minister. ``Whoever the person at the helm of the interior ministry, the path set out will be continued,'' the President told a meeting of his Cabinet.