The much-talked about players\u2019 draft programme for recruitment of local and overseas players for the third edition of Bangladesh Premier League will be held today at a city hotel amid chaos.
\nThough only one franchise has formally announced its name and logo so far, the players will be allotted to six teams much earlier than the original schedule in order to give them more time to gel as a unit.
\nThe original date for the players\u2019 draft was scheduled on October 31, but the BPL authority brought the date forward at least twice following the requests from the franchises.
\nAround 300 local and international players are to be drafted to the teams through a lottery system, first heard in Bangladesh in 2012-13 when the Bangladesh Cricket Board announced a \u2018players-by-choice\u2019 system for the Dhaka Primer League.
\nCertain overseas players would be dropped from the draft list provided the teams can submit the documents of getting their signature.
\nAs of Wednesday evening, only Rangpur franchise submitted a small list while others were still struggling to get their papers ready. According to the rules a team can sign 13 overseas cricketers, nine of whom could be purchased in individual capacity.
\nBPL officials however indicated they may finally have to put faith in words of franchise officials as time is limited for
\nthem.
\nHowever, all local players, including six icons, must be recruited through players\u2019 draft. The lottery of icon players will be held before the formal players\u2019 draft starts at 10am.
\nTamim Iqbal, one of the six icons, said he is ready to play for any franchise though he prefers his hometown Chittagong in the tournament.
\n\u2018Everyone wants to play for their home team like someone who is from Dhaka naturally wants to play for Dhaka while I would prefer playing for Chittagong,\u2019 Tamim said at a programme.
\n\u2018At the end of the day we all are professionals and we would play where we are destined.
\n\u2018We would try to perform well wherever we play. Naturally I would be happy if I play for Chittagong but that does not mean I would be hurt if I play elsewhere.
\n\u2018I will try to fulfill the reasons for which they had taken me and want to give my best performance. Let\u2019s wait for tomorrow to see where we play,\u2019 he added.
\nBCB vice-president Mahbub Anam will conduct the draft ceremony where cricketers are bracketed in four different grades as A, B, C and D.<\/p>\n

-With New Age<\/strong> input<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The much-talked about players\u2019 draft programme for recruitment of local and overseas players for the third edition of Bangladesh Premier League will be held today at a city hotel amid chaos. Though only one franchise has formally announced its name and logo so far, the players will be allotted to six teams much earlier than … Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_editorskit_title_hidden":false,"_editorskit_reading_time":0,"_editorskit_is_block_options_detached":false,"_editorskit_block_options_position":"{}","footnotes":""},"categories":[32],"tags":[3013,12609],"yoast_head":"\n