Muhammad Mustafa is a famous Pakistani blogger from Karachi Pakistan. Mustafa frequently writes on the topic of Pakistani sports, frequently covering the Pakistani national soccer and cricket teams. Pakistani culture is obsessed with the sport of cricket, an obvious byproduct of their former status as a British colony. I find Mustafa’s blog post was unique because although they are not inherently political, they still have a pro-Pakistan agenda always showing the Pakistani teams in a positive light.
In his most recent post “#PakvsZim: When your haters are silent, you know you’ve made it!”, Mustafa describes the recent victory against the Zimbabwe national team. What was interesting about the blog, was how some of the rhetoric blurred the line between sports analysis and nationalistic rhetoric. Mustafa describes the Zimbabwe team as “dispirited” and unable to counter Pakistan’s “dominance”. This writing offers some interesting questions, for instance to what extent can sports be used to create national identity and pride. Large events like the world cup seem to generate a surge of patriotic fervor and in the case of Pakistan, it is no different. Can successful national sports teams be used by oppressive governments to mask their acts or is the event to insignificant to have any real pollical implications?