Afghanistan Is Cricket’s Cinderella Story

O nly twelve countries are allowed to play cricket at the highest level. Cricket powerhouses such as England, Australia, India, and Pakistan all have “test status,” which means they are recognized by the International Cricket Council as being able to play international test matches, which can last up to five days and are considered the purest form of the game. The country to attain test status most recently is Afghanistan.

War-torn and impoverished Afghanistan is rarely present on any elite list, but its achieving test status in 2017 was a major national accomplishment. The Afghan national team has played in seven test matches so far, winning three and losing four. The Taliban’s retaking control of the country after the U.S. withdrawal in 2021 makes it much harder to schedule international matches. No other team wants to travel to Afghanistan, so the Afghan team has played “home” matches in India, Sri Lanka, and the U.A.E. The team still plays under the pre-Taliban Afghan flag, and a Taliban leader has warned cricketers against being “un-Islamic.”

The ICC Cricket World Cup is played under the one-day-international (ODI) format. Cricket matches are divided into “overs,” each consisting of six balls. In ODI, each side is limited to 50 overs, so matches take about seven hours to complete and are decided in one day. Non-test countries are allowed to qualify for the World Cup, and test countries are not guaranteed admittance.

Afghanistan qualified for the 2019 World Cup, the first held since it achieved test status, but did not win a single match. In the ten-team round-robin tournament, Afghanistan was beaten quite badly in nearly every match, including a massive loss by 150 runs against the eventual champion, England.

The ongoing 2023 World Cup allows Afghanistan a chance at redemption after that poor first showing as a test country in the international tournament. It’s also the first World Cup since the Taliban’s resumption of power, and it follows an earthquake in Afghanistan that killed more than a thousand people. Afghan cricketers have donated their match fees from the World Cup to earthquake-relief efforts. Afghanistan coach Jonathan Trott wants his team to “bring joy and happiness” to cricket fans in a country that doesn’t have much to be happy about right now.

The first match against Bangladesh was embarrassing. Afghanistan’s entire lineup was retired after only 37.2 of the 50 allowed overs, and Bangladesh easily exceeded Afghanistan’s piddly 156 runs. (Scores in the mid-to-high 200s are common for ODI.) In the second match, against India, Afghanistan had a much more respectable performance, completing all 50 overs with 272 runs scored, but India has been unstoppable this tournament and smacked 273 in only 35 overs.

Then came time to play defending champion England, who had so thoroughly defeated Afghanistan in the 2019 World Cup. England won the coin toss at the start of the match and elected to let Afghanistan bat first. Afghanistan put up a strong 284 runs, led by 21-year-old Rahmanullah Gurbaz’s 80-run opening performance. Then it was up to the bowlers to shut England down.

And that’s exactly what they did. English opening batsman Jonny Bairstow only faced four balls before he was retired by Afghan bowler Fazalhaq Farooqi. Joe Root, another star, was bowled out by Mujeeb Ur Rahman after scoring only eleven runs. English captain Jos Buttler was held to only nine runs before he was retired by Naveen-ul-Haq. Afghan star bowler Rashid Khan, who played in Major League Cricket in the U.S. this year, finished the job, taking three wickets. England was all out in 40.3 overs after scoring only 215 runs.

It was Afghanistan’s greatest international victory yet and one of the biggest upsets in World Cup history. They didn’t squeak out a win, either. They dominated both batting and bowling and never really let England into the match. “It will be a big celebration back home,” said Rashid Khan after the match. “I think cricket is the only source which gives them lots of happiness and lots of good memories.”

Like many March Madness upsets in college basketball, it seemed like the defeat of England was a fluke. Afghanistan was destroyed by New Zealand in the next match, scoring only 139 runs in its effort to chase New Zealand’s target of 289.

Then it came time to play Pakistan, which is not only a perennial cricket powerhouse but also a funder of the Taliban. Millions of Afghan refugees have fled to Pakistan, which is currently trying to expel many of them. Afghanistan had lost its previous seven ODI matches against Pakistan.

Pakistan batted first and put up 282 runs. Rashid Khan, who had been so good against England, did not take any wickets from Pakistan. The sixth and seventh Pakistani batsmen, Shadab Khan and Iftikhar Ahmed, each put up 40 runs, strong performances for the bottom half of the lineup. It was looking like more of the same for Afghanistan against its not-so-friendly neighbor.

After Pakistan’s 50 overs were complete, the Afghan batting attack commenced. And it didn’t let up. Gurbaz scored 65. Ibrahim Zadran, his opening partner, scored 87. After Gurbaz was caught out, he was replaced by Rahmat Shah, who scored 77. And Zadran’s replacement, Hashmatullah Shahidi, the Afghan captain, scored 48, which, with nine extra runs for penalties, was enough to surpass Pakistan’s 282 and win the match with one over to spare.

Defeating Pakistan is an accomplishment in itself. Defeating Pakistan using only four out of eleven batsmen is astonishing. Afghanistan’s methodical offensive strategy was executed to perfection, taking advantage of every opportunity from start to finish without being reckless. “This win tastes nice,” said Shahidi. “At the start of the tournament, I said we want to make this tournament historic for our country’s people. First was England, today Pakistan, and looking forward for the other games.”

The next game would taste nice as well. Yesterday, Afghanistan defeated Sri Lanka, holding it to 241 runs. Bowler Fazalhaq Farooqi took four wickets and conceded only 34 runs in ten overs. Despite Gurbaz’s being dismissed for a duck (scoring zero runs), Afghanistan still only needed five batsmen to reach 242 with five overs to spare. Fifth man Azmatullah Omarzai led the team with 73 runs, followed by Rahmat Shah’s 62. Again, it was Afghanistan’s patience on offense that put it over the top. “We’ve been working really hard on our batting and doing the basics right,” said head coach Trott. “Afghanistan has always had talent but now we’ve given it a bit of structure and a game plan.”

Seeing that structure and game plan pay off must be gratifying for Trott and satisfying to fans in a weary nation. Afghanistan is sixth in the standings right now. Only the top four teams advance from the round-robin, and the Afghans would need a lot of things to go their way to crack into the top four. They are favored in their next match against the Netherlands, but they finish against Australia and South Africa, defeating either of which would be another major upset.

Whether they advance or not, Afghanistan’s performance has provided the “joy and happiness” Trott promised. Trott’s new goal for the team: have a batsman score 100 by himself in one of the remaining matches. He wants his players to enjoy success in the present while building the program for the long run. In a country where the present is depressing and the long run is uncertain, its cricket team is offering a reason for hope.