BPL 5 set to shift to Sylhet from Dhaka

The fifth edition of the Bangladesh Premier League is ten weeks away. The BPL Governing Council is contemplating to move the high-profile tournament out of Dhaka due to the occurrence of the Commonwealth Parliamentary Union Seminar, which is scheduled to take place in Dhaka in the first week of November.

The Seminar is a big event and is coinciding with the BPL, which is scheduled to begin on November 2. No other major event can take place at the same time in the capital city of Dhaka which is why the governing body of the cash-rich T20 league has decided to shift the event to Sylhet which is around 250 kilometers north of Dhaka.

The main story

Initially, the BPL governing body was considering postponing the tournament by a week in order to accommodate the Seminar but changed its mind as the business end of the tournament would have collided with the start of the Global T20 League in South Africa. The discussion took place in a meeting which was urgently called for on Tuesday. The meeting was chaired by BCB Director Lokman Hossain Bhuiyan and the BPL Governing Council member who eventually took the decision to retain the fixtures and shift bases for the 7-team event.

Changes for this season

The BPL was initially planned to be an 8-team event this year but was again reduced to 7 participants as Barisal Bulls were barred from playing in this season. This year teams would be allowed to field 5 foreign players, a move which hasn’t gone down well with a couple of franchises. Teams are still procuring players and identifying the right combination for the upcoming event.

Dhaka Dynamites are the defending champions and beat Rajshahi Kings convincingly by 56 runs in the finals held at the Shere-e-Bangla National Stadium in Dhaka last year.