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Melbourne, Australia
Australia Test opener Usman Khawaja has backed Afghanistan skipper Rashid Khan's stance that the two nations should be playing bilateral cricket. Khawaja's stand is juxtaposed to Cricket Australia who has refused to play against the trouble-torn nation.
The reason behind Australia's refusal to play cricket with Afghanistan is 'deteriorating conditions of women and human rights' after takeover of Taliban following USA's exit.
"I personally think yes we should be playing Afghanistan," Khawaja told Nine Newspapers at event in Melbourne.
"I am sympathetic to both sides of the puzzle. I totally respect and agree with a lot of aspects of the stance Cricket Australia has in terms of women's cricket in Afghanistan, but there's also another side to it, of promoting and growing the game.
"This is the second time Australia have backed out of a bilateral series, and I talked to Rashid Khan. He was really disappointed, more so because the Afghanistan people love cricket, and for them cricket is one of the few things they enjoy and brings happiness, and the fact they were going to play Australia was going to be huge, and they don't get to see that now. So it actually hurts the people, and the people are separate from the government," he added.
The comments come after Afghan skipper Rashid said 'there's no solution' to Australia's refusal to play bilateral cricket with the Asian country.
The two teams, however, keep meeting in ICC event, most recently in the ongoing T20 World Cup where Afghanistan came out as winner in a humdinger of a match. Afghans had come close to beating Australia in last year's ODI World Cup as well but Glenn Maxwell's extra-ordinary innings saw the eventual champions power through.
Currently, Afghanistan have an outside chance to making it to the semis of 2024 T20 WC, given they beat Bangladesh and Australia lose to India in their last Super 8 stage match.