BPL franchises set to struggle signing overseas players

The Bangladesh Premier League (BPL) franchises will face problems to sign overseas T20 players for the upcoming edition of the tournaments as its date is clashing with Australia’s Big Bash along with UAE’s ILT20 and South Africa’s yet-to-be-named T20 league, reports Cricbuzz.

Bangladesh Cricket Board (BCB) earlier stated that they would hold the next edition of BPL from January 6 to February 15 while they have also slotted their time for the next two editions of the tournament. BCB has floated an Express of Interest (EOI) for potential franchise owners with the deadline ending on August 31.

Earlier, cricketers like Andre Russell opted for BPL but that looks hardly possible this time round considering the introduction of the other two leagues with UAE’s ILT20 slated from January 6 to February 12.

BCB chief executive Nizamuddin Chowdhury told Cricbuzz on Friday that Emirates Cricket Board has already discussed with them whether the dates of BPL can be changed but he insisted it is not possible.

“They (ECB) have asked us whether we can shift the dates of BPL but we said that we cannot do it due to our jam-packed international schedule,” said Nizamuddin adding that it will be a challenge to get the best of players in the present scenario.

”It will be a big challenge (to get the big names) but at the same time you have to understand that some of our cricketers are not available in their leagues so it will not be a challenge only for us but for others as well,” he said.

”The franchise owners will be in a better position since it is for three years and usually they want everything to be organized and so this time round we are hoping that it will be quite good since we are giving the teams a longer period,” he said adding that he feels that the franchise will probably sign a player for three editions to make sure that they are available in the long term as well.

While the franchise will be keen to sign the cricketers whether they will have them with the price tag stipulated by BPL remains to be seen considering BPL have fixed USD Eighty Thousand for grade A foreign players while in the UAE’s ILT20 the A grade cricketers are expected to get five times higher than that. In the Big Bash, the cricketers will receive three times higher.

In South Africa’s T20 league where most teams are owned by IPL franchise owners players like Andre Russell, Sunil Narine, Moeen Ali, Andre Fletcher, Dwayne Bravo, Mujeeb ur Rahman, Faf Du Plesiss, Rille Rossue and Colin Ingram have signed, whereas they played in the previous edition of BPL.