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The Guardian - UK
The Guardian - UK
Sport
Suzanne Wrack

‘I was lost but football gave me strength’: Afghan women refugees on their fight for recognition

Afghanistan footballer Elaha Safdari
Elaha Safdari, who has signed for Rotherham, says football is her ‘tool’ to show the world Afghan women and children are ‘capable of doing amazing things’. Photograph: Duncan Elliott

“I felt quite lost,” says the goalkeeper Elaha Safdari. “I didn’t know anyone, but little by little football gave me the strength and power to start again, to start from zero, to build, to keep going and to keep pushing myself forward.”

It is four years since a 17-year-old Safdari arrived in England, part of the Afghanistan women’s development team evacuated first to Pakistan then to the UK after the US withdrawal of troops and the concession of power to the Taliban.

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