If you search for a Scorecard for Pakistan Women’s Cricket vs. Afghanistan Women’s Cricket, you will find zero runs scored, zero wickets taken, and zero boundaries hit. This is essentially a rivalry between two countries that has yet to be played ; instead, there is an unfortunate absence in the history of cricket of what could have been. A lack of involvement with women’s cricket due to political turmoil has created a void, leaving a new generation of fans with a clean slate to view a possible scorecard that, for now, remains blank.
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The Series That Was Supposed to Happen
Only a small number of fans knew that the two sides would be meeting again, as both had been scheduled to meet in a series of the 2020 – 2023 ICC Cricket World Cup Super League. It would be a chance of a lifetime for Afghanistan’s female players to take on some of the very best in the game. The postponements in 2021 occurred due to a variety of logistical, COVID – 19 – related reasons, and when the matches were put on an indefinite hold and subsequently canceled. The reason that the games were put on an indefinite hold at the time they were canceled was the huge amount of political change that was occurring in Afghanistan at the time of cancellation.
Why the Team Was Disbanded
The primary reason there is no scorecard is the return of the Taliban to power in August 2021. Almost immediately, women’s participation in sports was effectively outlawed within the country. The Afghanistan women’s cricket team, which had been established in 2010 and was attempting a revival, was disbanded overnight. The players could no longer practice, let alone host Pakistan for an international series. This ban is the single barrier preventing any official match from taking place today.
Living and Training in Exile
Just because the team was disbanded at home doesn’t mean the cricketers stopped existing. Fearing for their safety and their future, most of the players fled the country. The majority of them now live in exile in Australia. They continue to train and keep their cricketing skills alive, hoping for a day when they can return to the international stage. But because they are not supported by the cricket board back in Afghanistan, they cannot organize official tours against teams like Pakistan.
Playing Exhibition Matches Only
Since settling in Australia, the exiled squad has played cricket, but these matches do not carry official status. They have participated in exhibition games against invitational sides, such as the Cricket Without Borders XI in Melbourne. While these matches show that the players still have talent and passion, they are not recognized by the ICC as international fixtures. Therefore, you will not find these scores in any official head-to-head record books.
The ICC Membership Problem
This situation has created a massive legal dilemma for the International Cricket Council (ICC). According to ICC rules, any Full Member nation that Afghanistan is must have a functioning national women’s team. Currently, Afghanistan does not meet this requirement. There have been ongoing discussions and calls from the global cricket community to address this violation, but so far, the men’s team continues to play while the women’s team remains unrecognized and unrepresented.
The players in exile have proposed a solution: they want the ICC to recognize them as a “Refugee Team,” similar to what we see in the Olympics. If this happens, it would bypass the need for approval from the current regime in Afghanistan. This would finally open the door for an official match against Pakistan. Until that decision is made, the rivalry remains hypothetical.
