Players from Afghanistan’s national women’s soccer team yesterday competed in a local league match in Australia for the first time since fleeing the Taliban.
The result was a scoreless draw after an Afghan goal was disallowed for being offside in a lower league amateur match in the eastern state of Victoria.
For the Afghan women it was a powerful, symbolic victory as they returned to the pitch together after leaving their homeland to rebuild their lives in Australia.
Photo: AFP
The game showed that the Taliban could not stop the players, said team captain Nilab, who like her teammates did not give a family name so as to protect relatives living in Afghanistan.
“We still continue our fight and our combat just to play for the Afghanistan people,” she said.
“We fled the country, but we are still thinking of our country and we are still working for our victory for our country,” she added.
Photo: AFP
Australia helped dozens of Afghan national women’s team players and their relatives escape when the Taliban swept back to power eight months ago.
The Taliban have since severely curtailed the freedoms of women, banning girls’ education and preventing women from even boarding planes without a male relative.
As players fled to different countries, the women’s national team was fragmented, but many settled in and around Melbourne, capital of Victoria, where professional A-League Women’s side Melbourne Victory helped them to return to the field.
Photo: AFP
Goalkeeper Fatima said that people who had seen social media images of Afghanistan after the Taliban’s return could understand something of the courage required by players to leave their homes.
“They can understand how hard and how challenging that was for all of us to be in that situation,” she said. “Today, we are playing as a team and together and powerful. It’s incredible.”
Team coach Jeff Hopkins praised their performance against amateur Melbourne side ETA Buffalo SC — a club established in 1982 by friends who had migrated from East Timor — in the Football Victoria State League 4 West competition.
“These young women, all they want to do is to be given the chance to just be treated equally, to be able to play the game they love,” Hopkins said.
“That obviously wasn’t happening for them in Afghanistan — they were being persecuted for it,” he said.
A few days ahead of yesterday’s match, Melbourne Victory presented the Afghan Women’s Team with their new predominantly red uniform, complete with shirts showing off the Afghan national flag.
The shirts are marked with numbers, but no names for the safety of players’ families in Afghanistan.
Bologna on Thursday advanced past Empoli to reach their first Coppa Italia final in more than half a century. Thijs Dallinga’s 87th-minute header earned Bologna a 2-1 win and his side advanced 5-1 on aggregate. Giovanni Fabbian opened the scoring for Bologna with a header seven minutes in. Then Viktor Kovalenko equalized for Empoli in the 30th minute by turning in a rebound to finish off a counterattack. Bologna won the first leg 3-0. In the May 14 final in Rome, Bologna are to face AC Milan, who eliminated city rivals Inter 4-1 on aggregate following a 3-0 win on Wednesday. Bologna last reached the
If the Wild finally break through and win their first playoff series in a decade, Minnesota’s top line likely will be the reason. They were all over the Golden Knights through the first two games of their NHL Western Conference quarter-finals series, which was 1-1 going back to Minnesota for Game 3 today. The Wild tied the series with a 5-2 win on Tuesday. Matt Boldy had three goals and an assist in the first two games, while Kirill Kaprizov produced two goals and three assists. Joel Eriksson Ek, who centers the line, has yet to get on the scoresheet. “I think the biggest
The Minnesota Timberwolves, with so many promising performances spoiled by late mistakes fresh in their memory bank, sure timed this strong finish well. Jaden McDaniels scored a career playoff-high 30 points and spearheaded Minnesota’s stifling defense on an ailing Luka Doncic, and the Timberwolves beat the Los Angeles Lakers 116-104 to take a 2-1 lead in the best-of-seven Western Conference first-round series in Minneapolis, Minnesota, on Friday night. “Jaden never looks tired. He looks like he could play 48 minutes,” said teammate Anthony Edwards, who had 29 points, eight rebounds and eight assists. Julius Randle added 22 points for the Wolves, who outscored
From a commemorative jersey to a stadium in his name, Argentine soccer organizers are planning a slew of tributes to their late “Captain” Pope Francis, eulogized as the ultimate team player. Tributes to the Argentine pontiff, a lifelong lover of the game, who died on Monday at the age of 88, have been peppered with soccer metaphors in his homeland. “Francisco. What a player,” the Argentine Football Federation (AFA) said, describing the first pope from Latin America and the southern hemisphere as a generational talent who “never hogged the ball” and who showed the world “the importance of having an Argentine captain,
RSS