KABUL, Afghanistan — The Olympic Stadium in Kabul has not seen this big a crowd since the Taliban used the place for public executions, with attendance mandatory.

No coercion was needed on Thursday to bring tens of thousands of delirious fans here to greet their national soccer team on its return from winning its first international championship. The underdog team stunned India, the defending South Asian champions, in a 2-0 victory in Katmandu, Nepal.

In fact, the police were trying, in vain, to keep them all out, worried that members of the crowd would get out of control and hurt the team with their adulation — which very nearly happened in some cases.

Few things could better symbolize the drastic social changes in Afghanistan since the Taliban era, when soccer was banned, even for small children. During the group’s five-year reign, and most of the 10 years of civil war that preceded it, Afghanistan did not even field a team in international competition.