Afghanistan Taliban crisis: Women’s cricket future grim, men’s cricket to be allowed

Afghanistan’s own domestic version of the IPL, the ‘Shpageeza Cricket League’ (SCL), a competition named after the Pashto language word for a six, added two more franchises on Thursday and will be played between September 10-25, the board said.

The Taliban have said they will not interfere with the Afghan men’s national cricket team, the country’s biggest sporting success of recent years, or stop the expansion of the flagship Twenty20 league, an Afghan cricket official said. The fate of much more modest women’s cricket programmes, however, remains unclear. Despite the turmoil caused by the stunning fall of the Kabul government on Sunday, the board has confirmed a one-day series against Pakistan will go ahead in Sri Lanka next month and said it was expanding the ‘Shpageeza’ Twenty20 league competition. “The Taliban don`t have any issue or problem with cricket, and they have told us that we can continue our work as planned,” said Afghanistan Cricket Board head of media operations Hikmat Hassan, adding that the team was ready for three one day matches against Pakistan next month.