The Bangladesh Football Federation on Sunday deferred the third edition of Bangabandhu Gold Cup by 12 days announcing a revised schedule from January 29 to February 8.
The six-nation tournament was originally scheduled from January 16 to 27 but BFF said it had to revise the schedule following a request from Bahrain. BFF president Kazi Salahuddin announced the revised schedule after he returned from Australia where he attended the Asian Football Confederation annual congress.
Bahrain promised to send their Olympic squad, but Salahuddin said their schedule does not match with the earlier date of the tournament.
‘We shifted the Bangabandhu Cup from earlier schedule as Bahrain told us that they will be hosting the Under-23 Gulf Cup at that time,’ Salahuddin told reporters on Sunday.
The Under-23 Gulf Cup will be held in Bahrain from January 16 to 26 and after that they will arrive at Dhaka to participate in the Gold Cup.
‘AFC president Shaikh Salman bin Ebrahim Al-Khalifa personally expressed his desire to send a team for the Bangabandhu Gold Cup and he requested me to defer the tournament,’ said Salahuddin.
Salahuddin added that few participating teams like Malaysia, Singapore and Thailand initially did not agree with the revised fixture but AFC president convinced the respective federation officials during the AFC Congress.
The tournament received a further boost as Channel 9, the host broadcasters announced that it has sold rights to Fox channel for Asia pacific region.
Enayetur Rahman Bappi, the managing director of Channel 9, said they will provide Fox the feed for broadcasting in Asian region.
‘Now we are trying to telecast the tournament in the USA,’ said Bappi.
-With New Age input
