The Big Interview: Farkhunda Muhtaj
In 2021, Farkhunda Muhtaj helped evacuate the Afghanistan youth team from the country, and now she is leading the way as an Afghan in a top European league. She spoke in depth about her journey...
The word hero can be thrown around very loosely, but to many young footballers in Afghanistan, former national team captain Farkhunda Muhtaj is just that.
The 26-year-old became the captain of the senior team in 2018, but after the Taliban takeover of the country, football within its borders has stopped, and instead Muhtaj became the face of helping to evacuate a group of 300 people from the country, which included 26 youth team players and their families.
The evacuation, known as ‘Operation Soccer Ball’, undoubtedly helped save the lives of many young prospects, several of whom have now gone on to play professional football abroad.
But it’s Muhtaj herself who has taken the biggest step, now playing full-time for Dutch side Fortuna Sittard who currently sit fourth in the Eredivisie, one of a few Afghan players in an established European league.
“We unfortunately don’t have Afghan national team players who compete in top leagues,” says Muhtaj. “There’s Nadia Nadim, who was born there, and is a phenomenal inspiration to so many women, but the reason I decided to play professional soccer is it’s been a dream of mine since I was young, but also partly because we didn’t have that Afghan player in a top league.
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“When I helped evacuate the youth team, they saw me as an inspiration and it made me recognise how much influence I had in their lives, but they themselves didn’t realise women who represent Afghanistan are capable of advancing in sport and academics, and I wanted to prove it was possible.”
The evacuation started in August 2021, over two-and-a-half years ago, and now her own career too is thriving, which we will come onto, but it’s only recently she has had the chance to reflect on a period she never bargained on when she set out to pursue becoming a footballer.
“It was happening so quick and there was a lot of emotions,” she says. “It was genuinely a roller-coaster of emotions going on and such it was such an intense and stressful situation.
“It wasn’t until I actually returned home that I reflected. It was very public and I gave a lot of interviews which was fine because I was just happy they were safe, but it was early 2022 I was on a podcast with CBC in Canada and that was when I first actually reflected because the questions were deep.
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