Shahid Afridi’s old interview resurfaced hours before Pakistan’s women lost their Asia Cup semi-final to Sri Lanka on September 11, 2026. The timing was brutal. The quote was worse.
“You cannot play cricket unless it is in your blood. The Chinese cannot play cricket. Our Pakistani women’s players cook well as cooking is in their blood.”
Shahid Afridi, ARY News interview, October 2013
The video has gone viral three times now. First in 2013 when it aired. Again in June 2026 after Pakistan’s women exited the T20 World Cup without a single win against a test nation. And now in September, as the Asia Cup collapse unfolded in Dubai.
Afridi was not asked a trick question. A journalist asked him about women’s cricket trials in Karachi. His response was deliberate. When the interviewer paused, expecting more, Afridi ended it: “Thank you. You got your answer.”
🚨 Pakistan women’s team after losing the Asia Cup Semi-final against Sri Lanka.
Shahid Afridi:~ “Our women cricketers are very good at cooking. Cricket isn’t in their blood, so they should quit cricket and focus on cooking.” 🤯
Afridi:- “Whenever our women’s cricket team… pic.twitter.com/khsMOAc9Sr
— 𝗬𝗼𝗿𝗸𝗲𝗿_𝟵𝟯 (@Boom_093) September 12, 2026
This was not a slip. In 2014, after the backlash, Afridi claimed the remarks were “taken out of context” and insisted he was “a big supporter of women’s cricket.” Five years later, his autobiography Game Changer confirmed exactly where he stands. He wrote that his four daughters are forbidden from playing any outdoor sport. “The feminists can say whatever they want about my decision,” he stated. “Cricket? No, not for my girls.”
The pattern is consistent across a decade. The clarifications contradict the record.
Pakistan’s women played their 2026 Asia Cup semi-final against Sri Lanka in Dubai on September 11. Captain Fatima Sana scored an unbeaten 47 off 36 balls, dragging Pakistan from 52/4 to 130/5. She then took 4/38 with the ball, reducing Sri Lanka to 33/4 inside seven overs.
It was not enough. Harshitha Samarawickrama and Kavisha Dilhari rebuilt with a 67-run stand. Nilakshika Silva finished it with an unbeaten 18 off 10 balls, including three fours in the final overs. Sri Lanka won by four wickets with eight balls remaining.
Fatima Sana was named Player of the Match in defeat. She scored more runs and took more wickets than anyone on either side. One player carrying an entire team on her shoulders while the most famous cricketer her country has ever produced tells her to go cook.
| Tournament | Year | Result |
|---|---|---|
| T20 World Cup | 2026 | Group exit. Lost to India (64 runs), Australia (113 runs), Bangladesh (23 runs). Beat only the Netherlands. |
| Asia Cup | 2026 | Semi-final exit. Bowled out for 55 by India in group stage (lowest ever T20I total). Lost to Sri Lanka in semi-final. |
| Women’s Champions Trophy | 2027 | Did not qualify. Ranking too low. |
The numbers across 15 years are damning. Since 2009, Pakistan’s women have exited at the group stage in 14 of 15 major ICC tournaments. The one exception was the 2009 World Cup, where they reached the Super Six stage before finishing sixth.
The System Behind the Collapse
PCB increased central contract salaries for women by 50% in August 2025. Domestic women’s cricket has existed since 2005. A T20 structure was established in 2019. Twenty years of organized cricket, increased funding, substantial sponsorship interest.
None of it produced results because none of it addressed the actual problem. Pakistan’s women play almost no competitive bilateral cricket between tournaments. Their domestic competition is not calibrated to international conditions. The men’s program receives high-performance camps, franchise cricket, and a packed international schedule. The women receive a fraction.
“Talent, without the infrastructure to develop it, produces nothing sustainable,” the Express Tribune wrote after the T20 World Cup exit.
The excuses are the same every cycle. The team is young. The conditions were unfamiliar. The opposition were better prepared. These explanations held some weight in 2010. In 2026, after two decades, they are an admission of institutional failure.
Pakistan will host the 2028 T20 World Cup, guaranteeing the women’s team a place. That is the only reason they will appear in a major tournament next year. Not because they earned it.
Insider Read
When someone like Shahid Afridi says what he said, it does not stay on television. It enters the dressing room. It enters every conversation a young fast bowler from Karachi has with her family about whether cricket is worth pursuing. It enters the calculation every father in Peshawar or Lahore makes about whether his daughter should trial for a provincial team.
Afridi is not a random pundit. He is the most recognizable cricketer Pakistan has produced since Imran Khan. When he says cricket is not in women’s blood, that sentence carries more weight than any PCB press release about investment or development. A 15 year old girl in Rawalpindi is not reading PCB’s salary announcements. She is watching Shahid Afridi tell her she belongs in the kitchen. That is the environment Pakistan women’s cricket operates in. Not just underfunded. Actively undermined by the voices that are supposed to represent the sport.
Fatima Sana answered on September 11. She scored 47 runs, took 4 wickets, and lost because one player cannot be an entire system. She did not need to say anything about Afridi’s comments. Her scorecard said it. Cooking was not in her blood that evening. Cricket was.
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