Four nations in next Bangabandhu Gold Cup

The sixth edition of the Bangabandhu Gold Cup will be held with the participation of only four countries from November 21 to 29 this year in Dhaka, informed Bangladesh Football Federation after an executive committee meeting Saturday.

The last edition of the Bangabandhu Gold Cup was held with six countries across three different venues with Palestine winning the title after beating Tajikistan 4-3 in the tie-breaker.

This time around, both the venues and participants have been reduced due to unavailability of national teams.

“Around 40 countries have been busy with the ongoing 2022 World Cup qualifiers and most of them are unavailable, so we have to reduce the number of participating teams to four. It is more important how Bangladesh national team can succeed, rather than the number of participants,” said BFF general secretary Abu Nayeem Shohag after the meeting.

Players from Indian Women’s League are interested to play in Bangladesh if the country’s women’s football league rolls on the pitch this year, Sabina Khatun told Dhaka Tribune after returning home from a successful maiden IWL campaign this month.https://t.co/tk4npSdpfA#SABINA

— Dhaka Tribune Sports (@Sport_DT) April 18, 2018

Shohag informed that Sri Lanka and Mongolia have confirmed their participation and that they are trying to confirm the fourth nation among Laos, Cambodia and Timor-Leste. 

All the teams are ranked below Bangladesh in the latest Fifa ranking except Cambodia.

After the meeting, presided by BFF president Kazi Salahuddin at BFF House in Motijheel, it was also revealed that the much-awaited Women’s Football League will take place in December and only the men’s football team will take part in the South Asian Games in the same month, and not the women’s team.