BPL 2019: Chittagong Vikings to play in the upcoming season, confirms BCB

It was earlier thought that the 2019 edition of Bangladesh Premier League (BPL) will be a six-side affair as Chittagong Vikings had told the Bangladesh Cricket Board (BCB) about their unavailability to participate in the tournament. However, the BCB has confirmed that it has managed to convince the franchise to take part in the upcoming season starting January 5.

The Vikings, led by New Zealander Luke Ronchi and runners-up of the 2013 edition, have retained Bangladeshi left-arm spinner Sanjamul Islam, Zimbabwe all-rounder Sikandar Raza and Afghanistan batsman Najibullah Zadran.

BCB waited for Vikings’ owner before taking the final call

According to a report in Bangladesh’s cricfrenzy.com, the BCB waited for the arrival of the Vikings owner’s return from abroad before going ahead with the final decision. As per the board officials, the franchise decided to change their earlier stand to confirm their participation in the tournament and also submitted a list of retained players.

“They have submitted their list of players retained for the past season. It was not the right time for withdrawing the team as you know all the preparation has been taken for the upcoming season and the draft is set to take place later in the month. So we discussed this to the Vikings owners and they eventually confirmed their availability for the season,” BPL technical committee member and BCB director Jalal Younus said.

The seven franchises of the tournament were given September 30 as the deadline for the list of four retained players from the previous season. The players’ draft is scheduled to take place in Dhaka on October 25.

The BPL started in 2012 with Dhaka Gladiators ending up as the winners in the first two editions. They won another title in 2016-17 as Dhaka Dynamites. Comilla Victorians and Rangpur Riders have been the champions on the remaining two occasions with the latter being the current holders.

The tournament was initially scheduled to be played in October but the BCB deferred it keeping the upcoming general elections in mind.

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