8 April 2009

Best film about Afghan cricket ever?

Afghanistan are currently playing in the ICC World Cup Qualifiers against teams like Denmark, Bermuda and Holland. Today they were beaten by U.A.E., which means they still qualify for the Super Eights round but are very unlikely to play in the 2011 World Cup. Considering that Afghanistan has practically no organised cricket, no proper pitches and just one bowling machine it is incredible that they have gotten this far, rising through Divisions 5,4 and 3 in the World Cricket League (beating Hong Kong along the way).

It's a heart-warming tale that has inspired a couple of excellent articles on Cricinfo, one with an interview of an Afghan player and another about a group of film-makers who have followed the team over the past 15 months. A trailer for the film, called Out of the Ashes (due out by the end of the year) is below.





Could this be the best cricket movie ever? Aside from Lagaan, I don't think there's much competition. Can Burblers out there recommend any other cricketing blockbusters?

3 comments:

Ed said...

looks great!

Anonymous said...

Why "very much unlikely"? They have beaten Ireland today.

Who knows what is in comming days!!

John Wright said...

'Unlikely' because they took 3 defeats with them to the Super 8s stage, which basically meant they had to win all their remaining games. They're still in with a chance though, after two very impressive victories against highly fancied opposition in Ireland and Scotland, but they need results to go their way. But they are guaranteed ODI status which is incredible given they were in Division 5 not long ago.