Bangladesh Premier League

This article is about the cricket league.

Following the success of franchise Twenty20 cricket leagues such as the Indian Premier League around the world, the Bangladesh Cricket Board announced a plan to replace the National Cricket League with a franchise-based league. On 18 January 2012, the board entered a 6-year, 350-crore deal with Game on Sports Group to establish a franchise tournament. The deal gave the group exclusive management rights to the tournament. The league was founded with six franchises from the largest cities of Bangladesh. During the franchise auction, 13 companies took part in the bidding process, with six winning the rights of each clubs.

The first edition of the league officially kicked off on 9 February 2012, excluding a lavish opening ceremony at the Sher-e-Bangla National Cricket Stadium in Dhaka, the capital city of Bangladesh. The initial player auction was held on 18 and 19 January 2012 and the first match in the tournament staged on 9 February 2012 at the Sher-e-Bangla National Cricket Stadium between Sylhet Royals and Barisal Burners. The first final game was between Dhaka Gladiators and Barisal Burners, with Dhaka Gladiators emerging as champions after winning by eight wickets. All matches in the first edition of the league were held at the Sher-e-Bangla National Cricket Stadium and Zahur Ahmed Chowdhury Stadium in the country's second-largest city Chittagong.

Rangpur Riders were added as a seventh team for the second season. Dhaka Gladiators again emerged as champions beating Chittagong Kings in the final by 43 runs. Once again Sher-e-Bangla National Cricket Stadium in Dhaka hosted the final and most of the matches while the MA Aziz Stadium replaced the Zahur Ahmed Chowdhury Stadium in Chittagong due to higher capacity and Sheikh Abu Naser Stadium in Khulna (third-largest city) was added as the third venue.

Following accusations of match-fixing during the 2012–13 season, the owners of all six original franchises were suspended in 2013 due to constant violations of the league regulations and constant delays in players’ salary handover. The owners of Dhaka Gladiators were handed a lifetime suspension by the governing committee.[2] A number of players and administrators were handed bans for match-fixing, including the former captain of Bangladesh, Mohammad Ashraful.

Following the match-fixing scandal, the league was not played in the year 2014. It returned in 2015 with six new franchises and was held in the winter season unlike Spring previously. Comilla Victorians won the competition, beating Barisal Bulls by three wickets. In advance of the 2016–17 edition of the league one franchise, the Sylhet Super Stars, was suspended following breaches of disciplinary regulations[3] and two new franchises, Khulna Titans and Rajshahi Kings, were introduced, bringing the number of teams in the competition back to seven.

In the 2016 edition, Dhaka Dynamites won the tournament for the third time by defeating Rajshahi Kings in the final.

In the 2017–18 edition of the league, the Sylhet franchise returned as the Sylhet Sixers with new ownership and management. As a result, the Sylhet International Cricket Stadium was also listed as a third venue. Barisal Bulls franchise was suspended due to financial mishaps.