Refusing to take no for an answer, the 24-year-old from Afghanistan focused on nothing but making the team.

Kherkah had the ultimate "told you so" moment when he found out he had made the first grade of Campbelltown Camden District Cricket Club and made his top grade debut on Saturday.

"I had set a goal for myself, they kept telling me I wasn't fit enough. But I love the game so much I kept coming back," he said.

But Kherkah's story does not just feature a struggle on the cricket pitch. In 1996 his father Abdul Salam arrived in Australia on a boat with 40 people, seeking asylum from Afghanistan.

After spending time in Port Hedland Immigration Centre in Western Australia, Salam was settled in Australia and then turned to finding a way for his family to join him.

"My dad came for a better future for us. He struggled a lot, but we weren't surviving over there, the way we lived," he said. "My dad took a very big risk."

Kherkah, a right-arm spin bowler, has been passionate about cricket ever since arriving in Australia in 1999 when he was nine years old.

And while his six brothers and three sisters took an interest in the game, none were quite so obsessed as Kherkah.

His dedication eventually made an impression on Campbelltown Camden cricket club's head coach Neil D'Costa.

"From a high performance cricket perspective he was pretty much an average-grade cricketer, but he just kept coming to me and saying, I want to train more, and I just kept giving him difficult tasks," he said.

"As a coach that has delivered players to the next level, most people come and ask me how, but they don't do it. He just kept coming back, to the point where I was thinking, this guy's not going to give up."

Give up, he did not. Kherkah, who now lives in Regents Park with his wife and two children, said he didn't believe D'Costa last week when he told him he had finally made the cut.

"I could see the tears in his eyes when I told him he'd been picked," D'Costa said.

"We have quite a few good would-be professional players on our side. We've got a team that, if you make it, you've achieved something."

Kherkah said his journey to first grade has been nearly all hard work but he said the support of the Campbelltown Camden club has played a big role.

"The coaches, the community, the players; I'm surrounded by people of all nationalities, and they respect me and I respect them.

"I love cricket so much. It has always been my dream to one day to play somewhere at a high level, to represent myself and to represent the Afghan community."