BPL 2017: Barisal Bulls stripped of participation in upcoming edition; Mustafizur Rahman up for auction

The Bangladesh Premier League (BPL) ever since its inception has been engulfed in controversies, from match-fixing to betting and to players violating bank rules for participation. With BPL 2017 round the corner, another storm has struck the T20 domestic league. The BPL governing council on late Wednesday evening announced that they are going to ban Barisal Bulls of participation in the upcoming edition. The decision was taken after they were not able to produce the required fee [TK 1 crore] for participating in the tournament this year. This means the BPL 2017 will feature seven teams as opposed the regular eight. It was also last year Rizwan bin Farouq, one of the owners of Bulls was suspended for life by BCB.

As quoted by Cricbuzz, Afzalur Rahman Sinha, BPL governing council chairman said, “We have decided to strip them [franchise Barisal Bulls] from the upcoming edition of BPL. They failed to put up any kind of franchise fee required to take part in the tournament.” BPL was stopped for a period of two years, after Mohammad Ashraful was found guilty of match-fixing. Sinha further added, “During the last board meeting we had given them August 7 as deadline for submitting their dues but as they failed to do so, we have to take this decision. We have to prepare the fixture for the next edition while we have to take other preparation as well. So we decided to host the upcoming BPL with seven teams.”

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With Bulls out of the tournament, Mustafizur Rahman’s icon status in the BPL is in question. Mustafizur was picked up by Bulls in the last year’s auction with a A+ contract. The BPL council will now decide on the future of Mustafizur and other contracted players soon. “Let us see what we can do as far as Barisal [Bulls] players concerned,” Sinha concluded.

BPL council secretary Ismail Haider said, “He [Mustafizur] will not remain as the icon. We are thinking whether we can put him in the BPL’s player’s draft.”

The BPL auctions is due to take place on September 16, while the tournament will begin from November 2.