MELBOURNE
\nPlayers from Afghanistan\u2019s national women\u2019s football team competed in a local league match in Australia on Sunday for the first time since fleeing the Taliban.
\nThe result was a scoreless draw after an Afghan goal was disallowed for being offside in a lower league amateur match in the eastern state of Victoria.
\nThe game showed that the Taliban could not stop the players, said team captain Nilab, who like her teammates did not give a family name so as to protect relatives living in Afghanistan.
\n\u201cWe still continue our fight and our combat just to play for the Afghanistan people,\u201d she told AFP.
\n\u201cWe fled the country but we are still thinking of our country and we are still working for our victory for our country.\u201d
\nAustralia helped dozens of Afghan national women\u2019s team players and their relatives to escape when the Taliban swept back to power eight months ago.
\nThe Taliban have since severely curtailed the freedoms of women, banning girls\u2019 education and preventing women from even boarding planes without a male relative.
\nAs players fled to different countries, the women\u2019s national team was fragmented.
\n\u2018Together and powerful\u2019
\nBut many settled in and around Melbourne, capital of the eastern state of Victoria, where professional A-League Women\u2019s side Melbourne Victory helped them to return to the field.
\nGoalkeeper Fatima said people who had seen social media images of Afghanistan after the Taliban\u2019s return could understand something of the courage required by players to leave their homes.
\n\u201cThey can understand how hard and how challenging that was for all of us to be in that situation,\u201d she told media.
\n\u201cToday, we are playing as a team and together and powerful. It\u2019s incredible.\u201d
\nTeam coach Jeff Hopkins praised their performance against amateur Melbourne side ETA Buffalo SC \u2014 a club established in 1982 by friends who had migrated from East Timor \u2014 in the Football Victoria State League 4 West competition.<\/p>\n
\u201cThese young women, all they want to do is to be given the chance to just be treated equally, to be able to play the game they love,\u201d Hopkins told AFP.<\/p>\n
\u201cThat obviously wasn\u2019t happening for them in Afghanistan \u2014 they were being persecuted for it,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
A few days ahead of Sunday\u2019s match, Melbourne Victory presented the Afghan Women\u2019s Team with their new predominantly red kit, complete with shirts showing off the Afghan national flag.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
MELBOURNE Players from Afghanistan\u2019s national women\u2019s football team competed in a local league match in Australia on Sunday for the first time since fleeing the Taliban. The result was a scoreless draw after an Afghan goal was disallowed for being offside in a lower league amateur match in the eastern state of Victoria. The game […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-257222","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-sports"},"yoast_head":"\n