Afghan women footballers revel in freedom to beat British MPs

LONDON: Young Afghan women footballers on Tuesday enjoyed a one-sided drubbing over a select team of British female MPs — but the score was secondary to their freedom to play at all. Back home, in recent days, the Taliban have reverted to misogynistic policies. Girls have once again been thrown out of secondary schools, and women told they cannot board planes without a male relative.

For members of the Afghanistan women’s youth development football team — resettled in the UK last November after an evacuation flight funded by US celebrity Kim Kardashian — there remains deep concern for family and friends left behind. But for 40 minutes, at the drizzly South London ground of non-league club Dulwich Hamlet, they focused on what they do best in a match against the UK Women’s Parliamentary Football Club. “I’m very proud of them,” Khalida Popal, an activist and former captain of the Afghan women’s team, told AFP after coaching her charges for the game.

“They’re practicing their human rights, and their freedom to play football, and to be together — that’s the most beautiful thing,” she said. “They’re very strong human beings, knowing what they have been through, the trauma, the violence, everything that they have witnessed.” Former sports minister Tracey Crouch, co-captain for the MPs, shrugged with good humor at the final result. Nobody bothered keeping score after the Afghan women’s lead reached double digits.

“They’re all really good, we’re all really bad,” Crouch said. “But that’s not the point. The point is that we have played this amazing game,” she added.