Courtesy: ICC
England are set to play against Afghanistan in the ICC Champions Trophy 2025 clash as scheduled after calls for a boycott by politicians in the UK (United Kingdom), who were citing the human rights record of the Taliban in the Asian country. The England and Wales Cricket Board (ECB) held a board meeting on Thursday, February 6, where the matter was discussed, and following which, they confirmed that the men’s cricket team will take on Afghanistan in the Champions Trophy match at the Gaddafi Stadium in Lahore on February 26.
Notably, as per the report from BBC Sport, there was a cross-party letter, signed by around 200 politicians in the UK, sent to the ECB, in which they asked them to stop the men’s cricket team from playing against Afghanistan in the upcoming ICC tournament, which will begin in Pakistan on February 19. Since the Taliban assumed power in Afghanistan in 2021, the participation of female has been outlawed for all intents and purposes
ECB donated £100,000 to the Global Refugee Cricket Fund to help female cricketers of Afghanistan in exile
The official statement from the ECB talked about the current situation of women’s cricketers in Afghanistan as “gender apartheid”, while wanting the international cricket community to have a coordinated response towards the same. They wrote, “At a cricketing level, when women's and girls' cricket is growing rapidly around the world, it is heartbreaking that those growing up in Afghanistan are denied this opportunity, but the appalling oppression of women and girls by the Taliban goes so much further.”
Moreover, the ECB also revealed that they have donated £100,000 to the Global Refugee Cricket Fund to help female cricketers of Afghanistan in exile. Furthermore, they will continue to try and push the ICC to take action on the matter while supporting the women and girls of Afghanistan, who are interested in playing cricket, especially when their men’s cricket team is doing wonderfully well at the international level in recent times.
