Jos Buttler believes England should play Afghanistan at next month’s Champions Trophy in Pakistan despite calls for a boycott in response to the Taliban regime’s treatment of women. A group of more than 160 parliamentarians signed a letter this month addressed to the England and Wales Cricket Board’s chief executive, Richard Gould, urging the governing body to consider a boycott of the match against Afghanistan, to be played on 26 February in Lahore.
Women were banned from participating in sport after the Taliban regained power in 2021, forcing the Afghanistan women’s cricket team to flee the country.
The letter, written by the Labour MP Tonia Antoniazzi, urged the England men’s cricket team “to speak out against the horrific treatment of women and girls in Afghanistan under the Taliban”. Gould subsequently wrote to the International Cricket Council urging the body “to intervene and show global leadership” in response to “the gender apartheid facing the 14 million women in Afghanistan”. Regarding calls for a boycott, Gould pushed back, arguing that a “coordinated, ICC-led approach would be significantly more impactful than unilateral actions by individual members”.
Asked if he and his players had been involved in conversations with the ECB, Buttler, England’s white-ball captain, said: “Political situations like this, as a player you’re trying to be as informed as you can be. The experts know a lot more about it, so I’ve been trying to stay in dialogue with Rob Key [ECB men’s managing director] and the guys above to see how they see it. I don’t think a boycott is the way to go about it.
“The players haven’t really worried too much about it. These things, you’re trying to educate yourself and read up on these things. There’s been some good stuff written about it that I’ve tapped into and I’ve spoken to quite a few people to try and gather expert opinion. I’m led by those experts on situations like this, but as a player, you don’t want political situations to affect sport. We hope to go to the Champions Trophy and play that game and have a really good tournament.”
Lisa Nandy, the culture and sport secretary, has called for the game to go ahead. “I’m instinctively very cautious about boycotts in sports, partly because I think they’re counterproductive,” she told BBC Breakfast . “They deny sports fans the opportunity that they love and they can also very much penalise the athletes and the sportspeople who work very, very hard to reach the top of their game and then they’re denied the opportunities to compete. They are not the people that we want to penalise for the appalling actions of the Taliban against women and girls.”
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England begin a five-match Twenty20 international series against India on Wednesday in Kolkata, marking the start of Brendon McCullum’s reign as all-format head coach. Ben Duckett will open the batting in his first T20 international since December 2023, with Phil Salt taking the gloves instead of Buttler, who will bat at No 3. Jamie Smith, yet to make his debut in the shortest form for England, misses out.