Two powerful strokes from the bat of a teenage tearaway propelled a nation to heights of euphoria and plunged the other into depths of mourning. Naseem Shah’s twin sixes in the last over of the Super Four match in the Asia Cup, enabling a one-wicket heist, sparked jubilant celebrations in the Pakistan dressing room as well as among the fervent fans at the Sharjah Cricket Stadium. But Afghanistan’s players stood speechless, gazing at the skies, and a couple of them broke down.

In the stands, though, a section of Afghanistan enthusiasts could no longer digest the reality of the defeat that they started breaking the bucket seats in the gallery and flinging those at the Pakistan supporters. Soon it escalated into an angry exchange of expletives and plastic water bottles between the two sections, before the local police intervened and swept them aside.

But the scuffle in the virtual world raged on. Former Pakistan fast bowler and television pundit Shoaib Akhtar wrote on his Twitter handle, captioning a video of the incident and tagging former CEO of Afghanistan Cricket Board (ACB), Shafiq Stanikzai: “This is what Afghan fans are doing. This is what they’ve done in the past multiple times. This is a game and it’s supposed to be played and taken in the right spirit. @ShafiqStanikzai your crowd & your players both need to learn a few things if you guys want to grow in the sport.”

Stankizai quickly retorted: “You can’t control the emotions of the crowd and such incidents have happened in the world of cricket multiple times. Am giving you advice next time baat ko nation pe mat lena.”

This is what Afghan fans are doing. This is what they've done in the past multiple times.This is a game and its supposed to be played and taken in the right spirit.@ShafiqStanikzai your crowd & your players both need to learn a few things if you guys want to grow in the sport. pic.twitter.com/rg57D0c7t8

— Shoaib Akhtar (@shoaib100mph) September 7, 2022

Tension between the two teams have been simmering all day along. Pakistan’s bowlers would roar and growl on the faces of Afghanistan’s batsmen after getting them out. Earlier in the day, after Afghanistan’s Fareed Ahmed dismissed Asif Ali, he vigorously punched the air close to the batsman’s proximity. Ali first pushed him away and raised his bat, threatening to hit him.

Before the incident blew into full-blown punch-up, the umpires intervened and defused the volatility. There were similar incidents in the past too. In the 2018 edition of the Asia Cup, Ali and Rashid Khan were involved in a fracas when Rashid wagged his finger at him after dismissing him. The incensed Pakistan crowd began mocking him and insulting him with derogatory phrases. A year later at the 50-over World Cup in Headingley, a match that ended in another last-over heartbreak for Afghanistan, some fans of both countries were bundled out of the ground after throwing chairs while some were denied entry as they were clashing outside the stadium.

A Kabul blast that cancelled a cricket series

Although their cricketing rivalry is nascent—they have duelled only six times in any format in international cricket—it has been incident-rich. There are deeper layers, cricketing and geopolitical, to their rivalry. Afghanistan cricket board’s close ties with the India counterparts—for three years Afghanistan played their home games in India and played their inaugural Test also against them—left PCB embittered. Pakistan felt that Afghanistan were being ungrateful to them, as most of the first generation of Afghanistan cricketers, from Mohammad Nabi to Rashid Khan, learned cricket in the refugee camps in Peshawar. PCB president Najam Sethi had then said: “The relationship between us has not been like an elder and younger brother, but like a mother and child.”

In a sense he was true, Afghanistan cricket was born in the crammed, makeshift refugee camps across the Durand Line, slicing the Pashtun heartland into two. Nabi was two years old when his family left his hometown of Logar, once known then as the Gates of Jihad and a bloody theatre of war between US-trained mujahideen groups and the Soviet-backed Afghan government troops, and sought refuge in a camp in Peshawar. Rashid Khan, too, left his hometown Nangarhar, in his childhood. All of them were groomed in local clubs, most notably Islamia in Peshawar, and were granted entry to play in Pakistan domestic cricket. In 2013, PCB and ACB had signed an MoU whereby the PCB will provide technical and professional support, including game-education programmes, coaching courses, skill and performance analysis, and basic umpiring and curator courses.

But with the ACB and BCCI fostering a warm relationship, ties between Afghanistan and Pakistan cricket boards began to strain. It reached a tipping point after the blast in Kabul on May 31, 2017, which killed 90 people. Kabul’s security agencies tracked the blasts to a local outfit but with Pakistan’s support. Trade and diplomatic ties were cut off and the

Afghanistan cricket board quickly cancelled a friendly bilateral series between them, saying that “no agreement could be valid in a country where terrorists are housed and provided safe havens”. PCB wanted an apology, ACB refused. Their ties have remained strained ever since.

Historical distrust between Afghans and Pakistan

A broader geopolitical tension has been stewing for decades, since the British drew the Durand Line, a 2,640km land border, ripping the Pashtun heartland into two. The largely porous border, a popular trail for smugglers, mostly running along deserted high-mountain terrain , has been perpetually disputed.

Five years ago, after several decades of deliberation, Pakistan decided to build a fence along the border. Almost 94 percent of the fencing is completed, much to the rage of Afghanistan, which has never formally accepted the Durand Line as a permanent border. “The good old days are over. The world is haunted by terrorists,”said Zahid Nasrullah Khan, Pakistan’s then ambassador to Afghanistan.

Either side of the border, it remains an emotional issue, as people have kith and kin across the border and their movements are restricted. Ethnic Pashtuns, who live on both sides of the Durand Line, and who comprise about 28% of Pakistan’s population and 42% of Afghanistan, are protesting too. Tensions between the two countries have only escalated since the Taliban seized power last year, and exacerbated after Pakistan’s pre-dawn airstrikes in Khost and Kunar Provinces that killed 45 people in April this year.

The tension has, invariably, spilled onto the cricket field too. And even though it might not have the lustre and history of India-Pakistan rivalry, Afghanistan-Pakistan one has a streak of antagonism that goes beyond the 22 yards, rather across a 2640-km border. And all it took was two powerful strikes from Naseem Shah to bring out the violent side of the rivalry.

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