However, if we talk about sports, Afghanistan’s pace is obviously faster than Nepal’s. At least, that is what the recent results suggest.[break]
Current results
The past two weeks proved to be glorious for Afghan sports. Afghanistan won the ACC Twenty20 Cup cricket tournament on Sunday in Kathmandu.
It was the third ACC Twenty20 Cup victory in a row for Afghanistan. On the same day, Afghanistan claimed the second place in the SAFF Championship football tournament held in New Delhi, India.
Afghanistan defeated Nepali teams in the semifinals of both cricket and football tournaments.
Afghan taekwondo aces Bahawi Nesar Ahmad and Rohullah Nikpai secured berths for the 2012 London Olympics through Asian Qualifiers on November 27.
Ahmad won gold in the qualifiers and Nikpai claimed bronze in the event held in Thailand.
On the other hand, Nepali taekwondo players’ hope to qualify for London ended with a poor performance in the qualifiers.
Past records
The Taliban regime had put heavy restrictions on competitions, and the war had diminished sports in Afghanistan. But the scenario is rapidly changing after 2002.
Afghanistan became the youngest member of South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC) as well as South Asian sports bodies. For the first time, Afghanistan participated in the 10th South Asian Games in Colombo, Sri Lanka.
Nepal won 55 medals, including nine gold and 15 silver in Colombo whereas Afghanistan won 31 medals, including six gold and seven silver.
In 2010, Nepal won 37 medals, including eight gold and nine silver. In the 11th South Asian Games in Dhaka, Afghanistan gave improved performance to win 32 medals, including seven gold and nine silver. More importantly, Afghanistan won gold medals in men’s basketball and claimed silver in men’s football in Dhaka to surprise other South Asians in the team events.
Nepal had won 14 gold and two silver medals in taekwondo in the 8th South Asian Games held in Kathmandu in 1999 when the game was introduced for the first time in the regional event.
However, by the end of 2006, the glory was lost when Afghanistan won three gold medals in taekwondo in Colombo and Nepal claimed only two gold.
Physically tougher, Afghani taekwondo players are now far ahead of Nepali players. In the 2008 Beijing Olympics, Rohullah Nikpai won a bronze medal, the first Olympic medal for Afghanistan.
It was not only in taekwondo but also in cricket and football that we were ahead of Afghanistan in the past.
Nepal had defeated Afghanistan by 47 runs in their first one-day encounter in 2004 but the latter won all the One-Day and Twenty20 matches after that. Nepal and Afghanistan were on the same level in 2008 and were together in the same Division 5 in the World Cricket League by the International Cricket Council (ICC).
Now, Nepal is struggling at Division 4 while Afghanistan has One-Day status and has already played ICC World Twenty20 in 2010.
Nepal was undefeated against Afghanistan until last week in football also. However, Afghanistan came stronger to beat Nepal 1-0 in the semifinal of the SAFF Championship held in Delhi.
Afghanistan on the rise, Nepal stagnant
Living as refugees in neighboring and foreign countries during the Taliban era, many Afghan athletes struggled to practice. However, returning to their homeland, many of them seized the opportunities to show their talents and make their country proud.
Cricket gained popularity in early 2002 when Afghani refugees, who had lived in Pakistan, returned home and took the sport with them.
“The war turned them to a broken country and now there’s an urge to come up in sports and show the world that they are much more than a war -torn land,” said Rumesh Ratnayake, Development Officer at the Asian Cricket Council (ACC) and Sri Lanka’s former cricketer.
According to Afghan cricket team manager Shafiq Asmat Stanikjai, they have financial support from the government, sponsors and international community involved in all sports.
“In cricket, we have good support from the government. We have an equally impressive sponsorship deal with Etisalat, the leading telecom in Afghanistan, and we’rereceiving grants from ICC,” said Stanikjai.
However, Ratnayake gave credit to the organized and combined efforts of the Afghan government, the cricket board and players for their success.
They are developing cricket so fast that they have prepared grounds, an academy and are now running school-level programs,” said Ratnayake. “These programs will help them advance more in the future,” he added.
Nepal Taekwondo Association (NTA) General Secretary and taekwondo Chief Coach Deep Raj Gurung stressed on the investment factor as a reason for Nepali sports lagging behind Afghanistan.
“The basic fact that has made all the difference is the planned way of investment. The Afghan government and international communities are investing in the development of sports in a planned way as they found sports to be an effective tool of diverting youths from taking up arms in a war-ravaged country,” said Gurung.
If we go through the website of the UK-based organization called The 2nd Chance Project, Gurung’s arguments prove to be right.
The project, in partnership with other organizations like Cricket for Change and the Afghan Connection, recently trained 25 cricket coaches and ran a development program for rugby.
In November, the national Olympic committees of the United States and Afghani as well as other US sports associations developed a partnership for the expansion of youth sports programs nationwide and for future training programs in the country. The partnership was taken as “sports diplomacy of the US” in Afghanistan.
However, ACC Development Officer Ratnayake claimed that the progress of Afghanistan is not only because of international support but also because of the support of their own government.
“For cricket development, the Afghani Government has helped the cricket board immensely. I don’t know the exact figure but I know that the government has invested more money than what they receive from ICC as grant,” said Ratnayake. “The same thing has to happen in Nepal also,” he added.
NTA General Secretary Gurung said that the investment of Nepal in sports is far less in comparison to even our neighboring countries like Bangladesh and Afghanistan.
“Except for organizing national games and participation in a select few international events, the government hardly invests in sports,” said Gurung.
The budget of the current fiscal year has allocated Rs 490 million for the sports sector. Of the total sum, Rs 380 million are for recurrent expenditure and Rs 110 million for capital expenditure.
Players
Afghanis are naturally athletic and the Afghani players are found to be physically tougher than Nepali athletes are.
“If we provide scientific training and abundant match exposures to our athletes, they can challenge the physical toughness of the opponent,” said Deepak Bista, the four-time gold medalist of the South Asian Games in taekwondo. “Afghanistan are playing tough tournaments and meeting tough opponents at international levels.
Their football players are either playing or training in Europe. Taekwondo players are training in the US and in Korea. All these opportunities make them mentally more prepared in comparison to our players,” Bista added.
If Bista is right, Afghani athletes have a kind of urge and “junoon” (craze and passion) to win.
“One of their reserve players was killed by American forces. Most of them have lost siblings, to either illness or war, and there has been a lot of suffering. But what they are doing now is making history. This is the chance they have,” the BBC had quoted Canadian filmmaker Leslie Knott during the ICC World Twenty20 Cup while he was making a film on the Afghan cricket team.
“The boys wanted to win every single game. In fact, they saw their future in cricket,” said Afghanistan cricket team manager Stanikjai during his visit to Kathmandu for the ACC Twenty20 Cup.
“Afghani cricketers are heroes of their country. People respect them. We can see big hoarding boards of these players in Afghan cities,” said ACC Officer Ratnayake.
The most successful Nepali athlete, Bista, who won four South Asian gold medals, two Asian bronze medals and Olympic qualifications, said that wrong management and practices in Nepali sports are to be blamed more than the athletes themselves are.
“We should be asking the players if we’re able to provide them their basic needs,” said Bista. “A Nepali player has many other things to worry about than just his own performance,” he added.
On the other side, private sectors in Afghanistan are also keen in supporting sports. A mobile company had awarded US$50,000 to taekwondo player Nikpai after he won the Olympic bronze medal in Beijing.
Conclusion
The rise and success of Afghanistan, still a war-ravaged country, proves that if proper plans and investments are made, it will not take long for a country like Nepal where talents and enthusiasm abound to succeed in sports.
Khatiwada is the Sports Editor at Republica
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