The Bangladesh Cricket Board is planning to introduce a two-tier National Cricket League from next year in order to raise the competitiveness, said the officials on Monday.
The idea came during Monday’s meeting between divisional teams’ representatives and the members of the tournament committee at the Sher-e-Bangla National Stadium.The meeting discussed several issues including the standard of the NCL, country’s premium first class tournament that is often criticised for its lack of competitiveness.
However, the officials resolved that there should not be any change in the format for the upcoming edition, which gets underway from January 25.
‘We want to make the NCL competitive through two-tier system,’ BCB vice-president AZM Nasir told reporters after the meeting.
‘The standings from this NCL will be considered to determine a teams’ place in the two-tier,’ said Nasir.
‘The tournament will be double-league based so that there will be enough opportunities for players to prove their worth,’ he said
After the inaugural edition of two-tier NCL, one team will be promoted to the top tier while another side will be relegated to the second tier to bring competitiveness among the participating divisions.
The NCL was regarded as country’s lone first-class tournament before BCB introduced Bangladesh Cricket League to give players more exposure in longer version cricket.
The BCB officials hoped that a two-tier NCL coupled with franchise-based BCL will encourage the players to pay more attention to longer version cricket, which is often termed as the only remedy of Bangladesh’s cricket agony.
To encourage the players, the BCB is also planning to raise the prize money of the NCL.
The four divisions of the first tier will receive Tk five lakh as participating money while the each side of the second tier will get Tk three lakh.
The first tier champions will receive Tk 20 lakh as prize money while the runners-up will be awarded Tk five lakh.
The second tier champions will earn Tk five lakh while officials said they are yet to determine the amount of prize money for the runners up.
The prize money for the upcoming edition, however, will remain unchanged
The initial 30-member squad of each division will be selected on basis of earlier performance while national selectors will pick the 18-member squad from them.
On basis of mutual understanding a player can play for another division if he is found out to be free.
-With New Age input
