Fatima Haidari was sat at home in Italy when she received a video call from Fifa chief Gianni Infantino. On the screen alongside the captain of the Afghan women’s football team, spread across time zones and continents, were the faces of her teammates, women exiled from their home country for playing the sport they loved.
It was Infantino who made the surprise announcement, informing the players that Fifa would be formally recognising them as a national team in exile, eligible to play in international competitions. Almost five years after many fled Afghanistan following the armed takeover by the Taliban, Haidari tells The Independent that the news was met with an outpouring of emotion.
