Faysal Shayesteh

Faysal Shayesteh (born 10 June 1991) is an Afghan professional footballer who plays as an attacking midfielder for I-League club Sreenidi Deccan and the Afghanistan national team.

Youth career
Born in Kabul, Shayesteh moved to the Netherlands and played in the youth academy of FC Twente, until he signed with Heerenveen in 2010.

Heerenveen
Shayesteh, 18-years old then, joined Heerenveen in the summer of 2010. He signed a contract until the summer of 2012.

Etar
In February 2013, Shayesteh joined Bulgarian A PFG club Etar 1924. On 2 March, he made his league debut in a 2–1 home win over Montana, coming on as a substitute in the 88th minute.

Songkhla United
In October 2013, Shayesteh made a transfer move to Thailand football club Songkhla United after his contract expired with Etar. He was given shirt number 10. He left Songkhla after they relegated in 2015.

Pahang
In July 2016, Shayesteh announced on Facebook that he joined Pahang. It was also announced that he will play with shirt number 10. After just 6 months he resigned with Pahang.

Paykan
In January 2017, Shayesteh signed a one-and-a-half-year contract with Paykan F.C. to becoming the first ever Afghan professional footballer in the Persian Gulf Pro League.

Gokulam Kerala
On 19 November 2017, Shayesteh moved to I-League and signed with Gokulam Kerala for a season, but appeared in a single match for the side.

Lampang
In June 2018, he moved to Thailand and signed with Thai League 2 side Lampang.

VV DUNO
In 2020, Shayesteh moved back to the Nederlands and joined VV DUNO in the Hoofdklasse.

Sreenidi Deccan
In August 2022, I-League side Sreenidi Deccan announced the signing of Shayesteh for the 2022–23 season. He was part of team that earned qualification for 2023 Indian Super Cup. In the group stage opener, he scored a goal in their 1–1 draw with Bengaluru. They maintained their good form in second match when Sreenidi defeated Kerala Blasters by 2–0 on 12 April, but failed to progress to the semi-finals after 1–0 defeat to RoundGlass Punjab in last match.

International career
On 13 April 2014, Shayesteh made his debut for the Afghan national team in a friendly match against Kyrgyzstan. He played as left fullback. In the 17th minute of the match he missed a penalty. On 14 May 2014, Afghanistan played a friendly match against Kuwait, where Shayesteh scored off a free-kick.

On 22 May 2014, Shayesteh scored his first goal with a free-kick from nearly 50 meters against Turkmenistan in the 2014 AFC Challenge Cup. After Djelaludin Sharityar retired, Shayesteh became the new captain of the national team. He led the team to the final of the 2015 SAFF Championship in Tiruvanantapuram, which was the country's last participation. He scored three goals in that competition but finished as runners-up, as Afghanistan lost 1–2 to India. In April 2016, he was named as Afghanistan's Athlete of the Year for 2015.

Personal life
He is the younger brother of Qays Shayesteh, who also plays football and represented Afghanistan national team from 2011 to 2017.

International

 * Scores and results list Afghanistan's goal tally first, score column indicates score after each Shayesteh goal.

Honours
Afghanistan
 * SAFF Championship: runner-up 2015

Individual
 * Afghanistan's Athlete of the Year: 2015