Bill Shankly’s (Liverpool legend) well-known quote about football, that it is not a matter of life and death but much more important than that, can also be applied to cricket. Especially in Afghanistan, where the Taliban – ruthless in their radical interpretation of religion and cruel to unimaginable levels, especially towards women – have accepted a compromise when it comes to that sport. And the word does not exist in their dictionary.
Cricket practically did not exist in Afghanistan until it was introduced by refugees who fled to Pakistan after the Soviet invasion of 1979 (and the subsequent arrival of the Taliban after their expulsion), and who returned to the country when the Americans intervened in the wake of 9/11. S. The national team was formed in 2001, and is the Cinderella of the World Cup held in India. Its best players have Abu Dhabi passports and the squad competes under the black, red and green flag of the defunct Republic of Afghanistan, which fell when radical Islamists regained power a couple of years ago.
But, in a considerable paradox, the intransigent regime that forces women to wear masks and does not allow them to study at university, instead recognizes the national team, and in one of the poorest countries in the world, with people dying of hungry, has found a million euros from who knows where to solve the financial difficulties of his cricket federation, build facilities and promote a sport whose clothing they do not consider sacrilegious, except in the case of girls. In just twenty years, thousands of clubs have emerged in Afghanistan in all 34 provinces and a hundred leagues have been formed, the most important of which is held in Kabul and attracts considerable crowds.
Top Afghan stars, such as Rashid Khan, Mohammad Nabi, Mujeeb Ur Rahman and Naveen ul-Haq, reside outside the country and play in the Indian Premier League (the richest in the world), in Bangladesh or the Caribbean. They never set foot in Afghanistan, and they join the team’s concentrations in the Arab Emirates (its unofficial headquarters) and other places abroad, on the eve of tours or international matches. It is not the ideal preparation, but they bring quality and experience to a very young team, with an average age of 25 years.
Since its appearance on the scene, the Afghan team has always had good pitchers, but what it has improved most recently is in batting, accumulating runs without haste and without taking unnecessary risks. India’s is the third World Cup in which it has participated. In the first they lost all their matches, but this time they defeated the Netherlands and powers such as England, Pakistan and Sri Lanka, in addition to putting Australia on the ropes, which needed a heroic performance by Glenn Maxwell to come back from a match that seemed lost. .
The progress of cricket in Afghanistan is one of the great miracles of sport given the regime’s repression, successive wars and invasions and the impact of international sanctions on currency exchange, banking and the circulation of money. Not only has the national team broken through, but stadiums are being built in the Kandahar and Khost regions, and a “high performance center” in Kabul. In less than a quarter of a century, progress has been made that would normally have taken sixty or seventy years.
Perhaps that is why, in a country where life is valued very low and death is rampant, it is not that cricket is more important than both as Shankly said, but it is a symbol of hope.
