A single moment of sheer relief.

That's what members of the Afghanistan women's football team recall when their plane fled Kabul for Melbourne, where their new life would begin.

Following a harrowing few days after the Taliban invasion of August 2021, the squad of 36 were desperate for freedom and safety.

They collectively burnt their football shirts and concealed their identities enough to board a plane under the radar.

One hundred and eighty others trying to do the exact same were killed by a suicide bomber just 48 hours later.

At the time, ABC coverage described the Afghan footballers as "of the [Taliban's] most hunted groups".

Women take huge risk to play football, illegal under sharia law

The team began the remarkable odyssey many years earlier, namely by existing in the first place, as women's football was, and remains, illegal under sharia law.

In 2014, the players competed locally, while still planning to one day represent their country.

Assistant coach at the time, former division one college goalkeeper Haley Carter was handed a merit award from the global players' union, FIFPRO, for the promotion and inclusion of women in Afghanistan's society.

This was welcome acknowledgement of the Afghan team's existence in the sporting landscape, but the relationship with FIFPRO would prove more critical than that.

Team manager and advocate Khalida Popal was the point of contact for FIFPRO, where a man named Jonas Baer-Hoffman would later advocate for them on several occasions.

Just two years later, in 2016, the players built up the courage to publicly call out the systematic violence and sexual abuse they had suffered at the hands of senior leaders of the football community in Afghanistan.

In 2019, Afghanistan Football Federation president Keramuudin Karim was found guilty of sexually abusing female players.

That experience solidified the strong working relationship which was called upon a second time when the Taliban took over Kabul.

Kabul evacuation was 'unbelievably frightening'

Together with a small group of other activists and human rights lawyers, Baer-Hoffman (FIFPRO general-secretary at the time) and Popal formulated an intricate evacuation effort over 10 days.

The end result saw 38 players and staff on flights to Australia before the airport in Kabul fell into the Taliban's hands.

"The players and their families showed incredible strength under unbelievably frightening circumstances," Baer-Hoffmann said.

"Ultimately, we managed to get them emergency visas to Australia, get them on the inside of the airport and on a plane out of the country.

"We had to improvise, and it was certainly not a role I expected to play in this job, but we were lucky to very quickly find a group of tremendous individuals who worked hand in hand to do the best we could."

Baer-Hoffmann credits Popal's "strength and courage", "without whom none of this would have mattered".

His strongest memory of that day was the moment they received confirmation that the largest group was on a plane and out of the country.

"I was in an [another international] airport myself at the time," he said.

"It felt quite surreal to sit there in comfort waiting to board a plane, while thousands of people in Kabul were desperately trying to find a place on one of the last flights out of the country.

"I was in awe of what they were dealing with, how they found the power to keep going with their lives at risk."

Baer-Hoffmann, along with government officials, organised humanitarian aid for the players to set up a new life in Australia.

Captain Fatima Yousufi leading push for recognition

Three years on, the players have settled into new lives in Melbourne, with a vast appreciation for just how differently the other half live.

Now studying at Deakin University, Fatima Yousufi, who self identifies as "goalkeeper by day, peacekeeper by night, messenger of the oppressed," on social media, captains the side officially called "The Afghani Women's National Team".

They fall under Football Victoria's third division and are supported by A-League club Melbourne Victory.

Under current Taliban rule, women playing sport is banned in Afghanistan, which means the side cannot be internationally recognised by FIFA as the national representative side.

For now, they hold onto their name and the hope that one day things might change.

Having burnt all their birth certificates and personal identification during the Taliban's takeover, Yousufi's siblings and teammates boarded a plane to Australia with nothing.

Despite having undergone so much trauma, the team captain is determined to have her team recognised at the highest level once more.

During the 2023 Women's World Cup jointly hosted by Australia and New Zealand, Yousufi described the ongoing effects of failure to be recognised by FIFA:

"We are all waiting for the recognition of FIFA to let us… again be a representative for our country as we were before, and not to miss big games," she said at the time.

"We were born to be fighters and we should fight with everything. This is the thing that the Taliban wants, to not have women in sport but if FIFA is not trying to prevent it, I think it's the same thing."

For Baer-Hoffman, the tale of the Afghan team is a "bittersweet" example of the powerful connection between sport and politics.

"It was through sport that many of these women expressed their desire for liberty and equality … but its systems were also a part of the reason why they experienced the harm," he said.

ABC Sport has partnered with Siren Sport to elevate the coverage of women and non-binary people in sport.

Sarah Burt is a multidisciplinary Sports Journalist based in Melbourne/Naarm with a specific passion for amplifying women’s sport stories.