T20 WC 2024

[secretzimbo]

Nah, it’s bollocks.

South Africa were banned for 20 years for their government sponsored inequality. Afghanistan should be the same. This isn’t something casual like quota selection policy, it’s outright discrimination and in contravention of ICC regulations saying full members should have a women’s team. They suspended us for far less.

Shadystan and Zimdesh have women's teams and they’re Islamic so that culture excuse doesn’t cut it with me.

Even if we are to put aside the awful human rights abuses for a moment….

Even in a sporting context Afghanistan gain an unfair advantage from not funding women’s cricket. Similarly funded members, for example Zimbabwe, and forced by the ICC to allocate a fairly significant (and growing) amount of the funding on women and girls cricket.

Afghanistan therefore get the unfair advantage of an extra couple of million dollars to go all in in their men’s side.

[eugene]

If democratic countries are allowed to starve and then bomb women to shreds then why stop at simply not allowing them to play cricket? Besides Afghanistan are in on merit. The quality of cricket they've played is remarkable. Almost made it to the ODI semis and now in the T20 semis and have beaten Pakistan, England, Australia, and NZ along the way.

Those alleged actions aren't covered under the ICC membership requirements. The Afghanistan Cricket Board banning women from playing cricket is in clear violation of ICC rules. It is also allows them to divert all funding to the men's team giving them an unfair advantage. This is how Afghanistan is treating its own cricketers, not the much more complex nature of international geo-politics. Rashid Khan said today that he hopes his team inspires youngsters back home, let's hope it doesn't inspire girls too much, they aren't allowed to be inspired or have dreams beyond being a child bride for a jihadi.

[Kriterion_BD]

Even if we are to put aside the awful human rights abuses for a moment….

Even in a sporting context Afghanistan gain an unfair advantage from not funding women’s cricket. Similarly funded members, for example Zimbabwe, and forced by the ICC to allocate a fairly significant (and growing) amount of the funding on women and girls cricket.

Afghanistan therefore get the unfair advantage of an extra couple of million dollars to go all in in their men’s side.

You are generally a well informed poster here, although we've disagreed on a couple of things. However, this actually doesn't make much sense, if it makes any sense at all for the following reasons.

1) Money doesn't score runs or take wickets. It doesn't hit the ball or bowl it. It doesn't directly translate to performance. In fact the correlation of money to cricketing success is probably at best 50%.

India gets 40% of the ICC revenues...do they win 40% of the ICC's championships? No.
New Zealand makes very little money compared to other full members, but have always punched above their weight.

Afghanistan still only has a fraction of the revenue of Bangladesh, yet in yesterday's game it was the Afghans who bossed proceedings like they were the millionaires and the opposition was Kangladesh (Begger Nation a pejorative often hurled from across the border). They only scored 115 on a very decent deck and still had the self-belief that they could defend it against a vastly more experienced side. Money didn't do that. Cricketing skills and self awareness did.

2) The ACB itself doesn't get any more money than the ZC. Yes many of the Afghan players are millionaires from playing franchise cricket but that doesn't affect how the team plays.

3) ZC has to spend money on the women's game that could have gone to the men's game instead. Thats true...but there are several points here:
a) How much does ZC actually spend on the women's game? 10 million USD/year? 5 million? 1 million?

b) If that money from a) above was instead given to the men, would it really make a difference to how the Zimbabwe men's team perform? Would it really turn Marumani or Madhevere into 30 average batsmen? Would it have pushed Zimbabwe past the line against Uganda, Scotland, or UAE?

[Kriterion_BD]

Those alleged actions aren't covered under the ICC membership requirements. The Afghanistan Cricket Board banning women from playing cricket is in clear violation of ICC rules. It is also allows them to divert all funding to the men's team giving them an unfair advantage. This is how Afghanistan is treating its own cricketers, not the much more complex nature of international geo-politics. Rashid Khan said today that he hopes his team inspires youngsters back home, let's hope it doesn't inspire girls too much, they aren't allowed to be inspired or have dreams beyond being a child bride for a jihadi.

So you are saying you don't have a problem with women being killed, just that you have a problem with them not being able to play cricket?

At least the Cricket Council is investigating Afghanistan's compliance with its membership requirements and no one is threating to sanction them if they rule against the ACB for banning women's cricket.

[andrea lanzoni]

Andrea coming across as a wife beater here.

C'mon....

I prefer to answer you about the money.
If ICC states how money is to be allocated and part of it is for women cricket, then whoever is not spending money by the rules should not receive that tied quota of money in the future.

This does NOT mean that ICC has to stop give money to Afghanistan. Just refrain from the quota tied to women cricket investment.

ICC money is not a treasure pot discovered by chance: ICC makes money from what the whole cricket generates. The more cricket, as a sport, is successful the more resources will be at ICC disposal. Afganistan is not a secondary pillar in worldwide cricket success, thus ICC (has to) redistribute something to Afganistan.

[Kriterion_BD]

To be fair, as far as I know, since the government change in Afghanistan in 2021 the ICC isn't even physically able to send money to Afghan banks due to international financial sanctions. The money goes into an escrow or fiduciary account or something along those lines in the UAE or Qatar and then is paid out directly from there on an as needed basis. The Taliban doesn't actually see the money because it never enters Afghanistan to begin with.

For example, in order to pay for the Afghan team's participation for the current World Cup, the ICC money goes into a Gulf bank, and then that money goes to Emirates or Qatar Airways to buy the tickets.

And because the money is held in escrow, the ACB is probably not even getting the amount of cash that ZC spends on the ZIM women's team. I'm just guessing here but that seems plausible.

[andrea lanzoni]

Nah, it’s bollocks.

South Africa were banned for 20 years for their government sponsored inequality. Afghanistan should be the same. This isn’t something casual like quota selection policy, it’s outright discrimination and in contravention of ICC regulations saying full members should have a women’s team. They suspended us for far less.

Shadystan and Zimdesh have women's teams and they’re Islamic so that culture excuse doesn’t cut it with me.

There is a difference with apartheid SA.
In the 1960s SA not only had a white only squad. SA didn't want to play against nations where there could be blacks in the opposition. Does D'Oliveira ring a bell?
I wonder how you can miss such a monumental difference with present Afghanistan. Afghanistan has never refrained from playing other squads because, say, thery are not muslims.

If ICC regulations go against member nations laws (regardless what we may think of such 'laws', regardless how much we may be politically in total opposition to them), it is ICC that has to fix itself. Otherwise we'll have a big wigs sport organization dictating ethics to the world, dictating what's good and evil.
You may be religious or secular, but depending from ICC as a source of ethics is something truly frightening.

[secretzimbo]

How are people actually defending Afghanistan here?!

[Kriterion_BD]

How are people actually defending Afghanistan here?!

I don't think anyone is defending per se...its more refuting the idea that Afghanistan have an advantage on other teams because they don't spend money on the women's game. You could give me a billion dollars and it won't cause me to start hitting sixes like Chris Gayle.

[eugene]

Those alleged actions aren't covered under the ICC membership requirements. The Afghanistan Cricket Board banning women from playing cricket is in clear violation of ICC rules. It is also allows them to divert all funding to the men's team giving them an unfair advantage. This is how Afghanistan is treating its own cricketers, not the much more complex nature of international geo-politics. Rashid Khan said today that he hopes his team inspires youngsters back home, let's hope it doesn't inspire girls too much, they aren't allowed to be inspired or have dreams beyond being a child bride for a jihadi.

So you are saying you don't have a problem with women being killed, just that you have a problem with them not being able to play cricket?

At least the Cricket Council is investigating Afghanistan's compliance with its membership requirements and no one is threating to sanction them if they rule against the ACB for banning women's cricket.

Of course I have a problem with women being killed, but much of what goes on in the world is outside the purview of the ICC. Afghanistan are in direct violation of ICC membership requirements. If Afghanistan shouldn't be banned for gender discrimination why were South Africa ever banned for racial discrimination?