There’s been so much bad news coming out of Afghanistan of late that it’s easy sometimes to forget that other, positive, things actually are going on
there. So I’ve decided to break with convention and quickly look at one development, itself against convention, that has, until recently, mostly passed me by: the blooming of cricket in Afghanistan.

The Afghanistan Cricket Foundation [pdf] (ACF) was founded in 1995 only a few years after cricket started to be played in the country, thanks to the influence of Afghan refugees returning from its cricket-mad neighbour, Pakistan. It has about 340 clubs nationwide affiliated to it, with the season running from September to April. Cricket is now the third most popular sport in country after buzkashi and football(soccer). For some it is a valuable distraction from the fighting, as one of the founders of the ACF, Allah Dad Noori has noted:

When I saw the situation of my country, all the suffering, I thought, ‘What can I do? At first they were not interested in the game but slowly, slowly you catch the monkey… I have seen people leave fighting and come and play cricket.”

In 2001 Afghanistan was awarded Affiliate Membership of the International Cricket Council, this after the Taliban had nearly banned cricket because they apparently thought (somehow) it was an American sport. And if Afghanistan can finish in the top two at the Asian
Cricket Council Trophy taking place in Malaysia in August, they will go through to the World Cup qualifying round in 2011. Some are even hopeful of getting Test-playing status a year after that.

But for now the national team, which has to practice on a concrete pitch, is concentrating on getting as much playing experience as it can. In February of this year they came second in the five-team Khaleej Cricket Tournament played in Kuwait City, losing
out to Bahrain in the final by three wickets. The next month in Mumbai, India, they thumped
an MCC XI by 171 runs, with 22-year-old fast bowler Hafti Gulabid from Jalalabad getting retired former England captain Mike Gatting out for a duck, caught behind. And this month they will be touring England and Wales, with their first match starting on the 11th of June.

The full itinerary is:

June 11 v Hoddesdon CC
June 14 v Royal Military Academy, Sandhurst
June 15 v Glamorgan CCC, 2nd XI at Swansea CC
June 19 v Loughborough UCCE
June 20 v Essex CCC, 2nd XI at Billericay CC
June 21 v Leicestershire CCC, 2nd XI at Hinckley Town CC
June 22 v Ditchling CC, Sussex

Technorati Tags: afghanistan, cricket