Should England play Afghanistan?

[Kenneth Viljoen]

So South Africa is first up against Afghanistan, should they play or not? I hope not but I'm sure they will, thus setting the scene for the rest of the tournament

Ironically South Africa with the apartheid ban, the Afghanistan exclusion of women to play is similiar no?

It would be unfair and a bit hypocritical to judge South Africa for playing Afghanistan when everybody played Afghanistan at the 2023 ODI World Cup and the conditions in Afghanistan were no different to what they are now, and everybody knew Afghanistan was going to be at the Champions Trophy for a good couple of years, now some politicians have decided to comment shouldn't put pressure on teams this should be addressed to the ICC.

 

[Northerner]

Of course they should play them , everyone else does, the bigger question is should the Afghans be allowed to play at all, i hate politics in sport but unfortunately it happens all the time, India Pakistan Sri Lanka Zimbabwe have all been affected in some way, the cruel regime in Kabul is about as bad as it gets,

 

[cnerd123]

Afghanistan should be stripped of full member status and everything that comes with that till they have a women's cricket team. The fact that this hasn't happened just shows how hollow the ICC is.

 

[Betterpolo]

There's no point one team boycotting Afghanistan as you've really hurt your chances to get in the semi finals (only need one loss to be eliminated)

And there's no point all teams boycotting as then Afghanistan would win the Champions Trophy.

ICC should have upheld their own rules and suspended Afghanistan when they stopped allowing women to play cricket

Based on the Word Cup it will harm our chances of reaching the semis if we do play them too

Seriously though, we knew the score when we entered so it's the wrong time now. In any case I agree this needs to de decided by all countries.

 

[Starfighter]

The ICC really are the most useless governing board in all of sport

I can think of others

 

[Burgey]

Afghanistan should be stripped of full member status and everything that comes with that till they have a women's cricket team. The fact that this hasn't happened just shows how hollow the ICC is.

 

[Arachnödouche2.0]

England should be banned for one year every five years for ****ing up the rest of the world in retrospect. Should see us through to the next millenium.