Done on Afghanistan
03-25-2010 1:12 pm

Afghanistan's inexorable rise through world cricket has amazed even the man responsible for bridging the gap between the elite and the aspiring nations.

Richard Done, the ICC's high-performance manager (shown right in photo), goes about his work with a rigid impartiality but couldn't hide his smile on the VIP balcony at Dubai International Stadium as Afghanistan crushed Ireland in the final of the World Twenty20 Qualifier in February.

If that was history in the making, cricket's newest and most potent force rubber-stamping their first appearance at a major tournament in style, it was only the equal of their efforts a fortnight later at Sharjah. Shrugging off a first-innings deficit of 302, Kabir Khan's fearless youngsters compiled 494-4 at almost five runs an over to beat Canada in the Intercontinental Cup.

These are confounding events for a man in Done's position. Both the Australian and Bob Woolmer, his predecessor, have brought a missionary zeal to their work in helping rich western countries like Ireland and Canada build smart, sustainable models for cricket development. Then a country comes along, ravaged � now and for the lifetime of most of its inhabitants - by conflict and oppression, and rips up the textbook.

However, while those three weeks in Dubai came as a revelation to anyone who had only read about Afghanistan's cricketers on the internet, Done, like Cricket Europe's adventurous correspondents, had seen it coming after witnessing their layer-by-layer romp through the World Cricket League since 2008.

"I suppose now we expect to see the continual improvement, because they've been doing it for a couple of years now," Done reflected.

"Division 5, Division 4, they haven't really missed a beat and you could say the fifth place and just missing out on the World Cup last April was them levelling out for a moment. But the reality is they are full-time, they have been with each other on this journey for the last two years at least, there is consistency around the squad and the opportunity to train together and play together is a pretty good recipe for success.

"Add to that the fact that the background for a lot of them is the being in the refugee situation, being in Pakistan at that time of their lives and learning the game. All in all it's a pretty good mix."

Afghanistan are currently in Lahore preparing at the PCA Academy for their big World Twenty20 adventure. Beating Ireland for a second time at the Qualifier brought the mixed blessing of�dates in the Caribbean�with India and South Africa, so many of whose players have written templates for how to play the 20-over game, at least domestically. But nobody should put it past them to give one or the other a fright. Their improvement in all three formats suggests their addition to serious international cricket will only be beneficial.

As the elite prepare for their first glimpse of Khan's platoon of dashing all-rounders, questions will be asked about how Afghanistan's success story can be extended, and where they�intend to call home. Returning to Dubai, where almost 5,000 expatriates took in their February adventures, seems to this observer a no-brainer.

"I don't think it matters where they go in the world � it's a home game," chuckled Done. "They had 1,500 at the ODIs at the VRA ground in Amstelveen, which caught them by surprise. But the support here was great, and it's feasible � obviously Pakistan are basing themselves in the UAE at times.

"We'll endeavour for them to play neutrally for all their home games, and if they had a preference for being in one place in particular we would try to make that happen. Obviously that has to happen in coordination with the country itself, which in this case is the Emirates Cricket Board.

"I suppose potentially it does [become a commercial opportunity], and they might say that with the upkeep of the ground, they keep the money. But this is an obvious base for most of their home games.

"The game that Ireland played against Afghanistan in Sri Lanka was effectively an Afghanistan home game, and it fitted nicely into a preparation series for the World T20 Qualifier. Sri Lanka hosted it for us and did a great job, and that�s fantastic."

One of the keys to Afghanistan's success has been a sense of shared purpose. The only guarantee is that the honeymoon will not last. The more players get, the more they want, and Khan has already had to smother one potential mutiny, when Karim Khan Sadiq quit in protest at the manner of his brother's omission from the squad.

Karim came back, and there was a beautiful symbiosis about their efforts in the UAE, but when captain Nowroz Mangal was asked in the immediate aftermath of qualification what advances he would like to see in Afghan cricket, he said: "We would like to see some sort of salary. To play cricket full-time we rely on the goodwill of our families."

Done's response was instructive. Afghanistan are currently in receipt of the same ICC funding as Scotland, $850,000 a year between 2009 and 2013, which is more than even Ireland were getting this time last year, and there is something wrong if the Afghan board cannot keep players happy on that basis. The more hero worship they receive in places like Dubai, the more rewards they will feel entitled to, but they must recognise that their efforts do not at present generate any commercial revenue.

"They certainly train in Kabul and obviously move out for training camps around the place. But they are all together; cricket is their job," Done said.

"It depends what you evaluate a full-time professional is and the Afghans and Kenyans don't get paid anything like, say, an English county player. But they certainly have a basic contract system, and the effect of it is that they play full-time cricket together.

"They're involved very much in the High Performance Programme as one of the six teams, and they get all the advantages of that. With the ACC who run their programmes, they help to push them in the right direction and it's up to us to coordinate with the ACC to get the best programme together.

"ICC funding to all of the countries increased on average three to four-fold from 2009 onwards. There is extra funding there to be allocated to the development of the game. But it just becomes a question of priorities: there is not enough money to travel the world, play tours, professionalise players, increase facilities and all the rest of it. But that's a reality for most of the countries.

"Some of the new funding will go towards improving facilities [in Afghanistan]; I know they have got plans to open up small academies in six or eight of their regions to keep players coming through.

"Potentially, there are probably two ways countries are going to become forces in the game. One is by growing the commercial side of the game and find ways through that to improve, and obviously the other one is where you've got a large playing base and the strength is coming through to take you to the next level.

"When you look at the interest in the game, who knows where this story ends? It's a great one so far, that they have got this far. They're competitive and there's no reason why they shouldn't do well on the world stage.

"The next step for them is playing full members and they're going to do that in the West Indies. I just think that for all the HP countries, access to a better level of competition is always key because unless you are playing against better players, it's very hard to set standards you want to achieve.

"At the moment they are probably setting the standards in the associate world. Their bowling and their fielding are very well up to standard. The batting is solid without being outstanding, but they're only going to become better players.

"The ad hoc minimum is for the top two sides, currently Ireland and Kenya, to get a home and away series each year of one or two matches. For the other four countries it's one home or one away series. Obviously even that is not enough; we'd like more. We're trying to get exposure for all the HP countries and we are scraping around and getting what we can."