MEMBERS of the Afghanistan women’s football team hailed an “important victory” yesterday as they were among a group of more than 75 people evacuated on a flight from Kabul.

Global players’ union Fifpro thanked the Australian government for making the evacuation of players, team officials, family members and other female athletes possible, with work continuing to help more people leave Afghanistan.

“These young women, both as athletes and activists, have been in a position of danger and on behalf of their peers around the world — we thank the international community for coming to their aid,” the union said in a statement.

The team was created in 2007 in a country where women playing sport was seen as a political act of defiance against the Taliban.

Players had been advised this month to delete social media posts and photographs of them with the team in a bid to avoid reprisals since the US-backed Afghan government fell.

“The last few days have been extremely stressful but today we have achieved an important victory,” former captain Khalida Popal said.

Popal is among a team of Fifpro lawyers and advisors who have worked with authorities in six countries, including Australia, the US and Britain, to get athletes and their families onto evacuation lists and flights to safety.

“The women footballers have been brave and strong in a moment of crisis and we hope they will have a better life outside Afghanistan,” she said.

Fifpro general secretary Jonas Baer-Hoffmann said evacuations had been “an incredibly complex process.”

“Our hearts go out to all the others who remain stranded in the country against their will,” he said.