The players draft of the approaching Bangladesh Premier League will take place on November 23, confirmed the leagues’ member secretary Ismail Haider Mallick.

The ninth edition of the BPL will be played from January 5 to February 16, 2023.

‘We have decided to hold the players draft on November 23,’ said Mallick.

Despite having all positive intents, the Bangladesh Cricket Board failed to hold the last two editions of the BPL in a tantalizing manner due to the COVID-19 surge across the globe that started on March 2, 2020.

However, the forthcoming ninth edition of the BPL was also anticipated to be unexcited on the back of the unavailability of the big names due to their commitments with the other leagues like, Big Bash, UAE ILT20 and South Africa’s T20 League that clashed with the BPL fixtures.

But Bangladesh Premier League governing council chairman Sheikh Sohel assured that the availability of the Pakistan players alongside other big names would make the country’s lone T20 franchise tournament more competitive than the previous two versions.

‘Of course, their appearance would make the tournament more competitive than the early two versions, as the COVID-19 pandemic halted our ways,’ told Sohel a couple of weeks back.

The seven franchises who have been handed a three-year contract are: Fortune Barisal Sports Ltd, Mindtree Limited-Khulna, Progoti Green Auto Rice Mils Ltd-Dhaka, Future Sports Bangladesh Limited-Sylhet, Toggi Sports Limited [Bashundhara Group]-Rangpur, Delta Sports Limited-Chattogram, Cumilla Legends Limited-Cumilla.