Mazar Update: Skateistan vs the National Football Team

As the opportunity for women to practice sports in Afghanistan is often limited, Skateistan aims to facilitate and encourage girls to take part and compete in a safe environment. At Skateistan in Mazar, a group of Youth Leaders and Staff Members joined together to start a football team. Last week, they headed out to compete in a friendly match against the Mazar National Team. Educator Noorzai gives us the details of what went on.
Words by Noorzai.
At Skateistan we always take care of students to provide them with opportunities. As it is hard for girls to do sports, even football, we are taking care of it to provide them with a safe place and quality equipment. Even the families sometimes find it hard that their girls are doing sports, but we are making it possible with good reason. Whenever we are having any demos we invite the families and give them the chance to meet and talk with other families, and see the changes in their girl’s ability, to show why sport is good.

Every week, the girls who are taking part in Skateistan’s football team go to practice new tricks and become better than they were in the past. This week, our football team went to have a friendly competition with Mazar girl’s National football team.
As the competition brought changes to the athlete’s minds, it was really helpful for them to learn from each other and make new friends. The teams played really well with each other and they had finished without any issue. The Mazar National team won the competition 3–2.

At the end of the competition, the leader of the Skateistan team said “it was a big experience for us to be ready for the future. As we are the new team we can beat them in the future and not worry about this time – it can teach us many good things.”
Skateistan supports girls to do sports and receiving education. The girls who are coming to Skateistan feel happy and comfortable!
Learn more about what we do and how we use sport and education to empower children and youth worldwide at skateistan.org

