The Bangladesh Premier League (BPL), officially known as TVS Bangladesh Premier League for sponsorship reasons, is a top tier of

Bangladesh Bangladesh (}, ), officially the People's Republic of Bangladesh, is a country in South Asia. It is the eighth-most populous country in the world, with a population exceeding 165 million people in an area of . Bangladesh is among the mos ...

i professional

football Football is a family of team sports that involve, to varying degrees, kicking a ball to score a goal. Unqualified, the word ''football'' normally means the form of football that is the most popular where the word is used. Sports commonly c ...

league pyramid. It is run directly by the professional football league committee of

Bangladesh Football Federation Bangladesh Football Federation (, ''Bānlādēśa phuṭabala phēḍārēśana'') is the governing body that administrates the sport of association football in Bangladesh. It is in charge of running the country's men's and women's national tea ...

(BFF).

Dhaka Derby The Dhaka Derby is a football rivalry between the Dhaka teams of Abahani and Mohammedan, although the rivalry was bigger in the past, it is still considered to be the biggest game in the country's domestic football scene. Mohammedan was founded ...

is one of the most popular matches in the league. The league is the successor of Dhaka Premier Division League, which existed from 1948 to 2006.

History

Founded in 2007, the league was previously known as the B League. The league was renamed to Bangladesh League in 2009 Then in 2012, it was renamed to Bangladesh Premier League (BPL). The start of BPL marked the start of professional league and a wide open national league. The first B League match took place on 2 March 2007 between

Dhaka Abahani Abahani Limited Dhaka ( bn, ঢাকা আবাহনী লিমিটেড), also referred as Dhaka Abahani or Abahani Limited, is a Bangladeshi professional football club based in the Dhanmondi area of Dhaka, Bangladesh. The club cur ...

and

Muktijoddha Sangsad KC Muktijoddha Sangsad KC ( bn, মুক্তিযোদ্ধা সংসদ ক্রীড়া চক্র) is a Bangladeshi professional football club based in Dhaka, Bangladesh. The club is nicknamed The Freedom Fighters. It competes i ...

. The match, which took place at the

Bangabandhu National Stadium Bangabandhu National Stadium ( bn, বঙ্গবন্ধু জাতীয় স্টেডিয়াম, ''romanised: Bongobondhu jateeyo stediyaam''), also known as Dhaka Stadium, and formerly known as Dacca Stadium, is the national s ...

Dhaka Dhaka ( or ; bn, ঢাকা, Ḍhākā, ), formerly known as Dacca, is the capital and largest city of Bangladesh, as well as the world's largest Bengali-speaking city. It is the eighth largest and sixth most densely populated city ...

, ended in a goalless draw. The next day in Khulna, Prashanta Dey scored the first goal in the history of professional football in the country as Khulna Abahani blanked the capital side

Rahmatganj MFS Rahmatganj Muslim Friends Society is a sports club of Bangladesh based in Old Dhaka. It was founded in 1933. It is currently playing in the Bangladesh Premier League. It was also a team of Bangladesh Championship League until it got promotion in ...

2–0. On 27 March 2007,

Alfaz Ahmed Alfaz Ahmed ( bn, আলফাজ আহমদ; born: 7 July 1973) is a retired Bangladeshi footballer who played for the Bangladesh national football team from 1995 to 2008. He is seen as one of the best strikers to ever play for Bangladesh. He ...

netted the first hat-trick in B.League history to give

Muktijoddha SKC Muktijoddha Sangsad KC ( bn, মুক্তিযোদ্ধা সংসদ ক্রীড়া চক্র) is a Bangladeshi professional football club based in Dhaka, Bangladesh. The club is nicknamed The Freedom Fighters. It competes i ...

a 4–1 win over

have won the league a record six times since 2007. During 2015–16 Bangladesh Football Premier League, Dhaka Abahani also became the first team to win the professional league title with an unbeaten record.

Competition format

Champions

Successful clubs by seasons

Performance by clubs

Clubs

Current clubs (2022–23)

Former clubs

The following clubs are not competing in the Bangladesh Football Premier League during the 2021–22 season but competed in the Premier League for at least one season.

All-time BPL table

The all-time BPL table is an overall record of all match results, points, and goals of every team that has played in BPL since its inception in

2007 File:2007 Events Collage.png, From top left, clockwise: Steve Jobs unveils Apple's first iPhone; TAM Airlines Flight 3054 overruns a runway and crashes into a gas station, killing almost 200 people; Former Pakistani Prime Minister of Pakistan, Pr ...

. The table is accurate as of the end of the 2021–22 season. Teams in bold are part of the 2022–23 season. Numbers in bold are the record (highest either positive or negative) numbers in each column. League or status at 2022–23 season:

Head coaches

In terms of coaching performance, after the first 11 seasons of the BPL, a Bangladeshi head coach has won the BPL six times while a foreign head coach has won it five times.

Pakir Ali Pakir Ali is a Sri Lankan retired professional footballer and football coach, who currently manages Bangladesh Premier League side Bangladesh Police FC. His last success was leading the Sheikh Jamal Dhanmondi Club to the Bangladesh League 201 ...

Sri Lanka Sri Lanka (, ; si, ශ්‍රී ලංකා, Śrī Laṅkā, translit-std=ISO (); ta, இலங்கை, Ilaṅkai, translit-std=ISO ()), formerly known as Ceylon and officially the Democratic Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka, is an ...

was the first foreign head coach to win the BPL while the second coach was Ali Akbar Pourmoslemi of

Iran Iran, officially the Islamic Republic of Iran, and also called Persia, is a country located in Western Asia. It is bordered by Iraq and Turkey to the west, by Azerbaijan and Armenia to the northwest, by the Caspian Sea and Turkmeni ...

. Spaniard

Óscar Bruzón Óscar Bruzón Barreras (born 29 May 1977) is a retired Spanish footballer who played as either a winger or a defensive midfielder, and currently managing Bashundhara Kings in the Bangladesh Premier League. Playing career Bruzón was born in V ...

was the most recent foreign coach to win the BPL in the 2018–19 season. Amalesh Sen was the first Bangladeshi coach to win the BPL in the league's opening season and he has the most BPL championships at three.

Maruful Haque Maruful Haque ( bn, মারুফুল হক) is a Bangladeshi professional football coach and former player, who is currently the head coach of Sheikh Jamal DC. He is the first-ever South Asian to get a UEFA A license in 2015. Early stag ...

and Atiqur Rahman Atiq the only other Bangladeshi coach to win the Bangladesh Premier League. The current head coaches in the Bangladesh Premier League are:

Stats and players

Seasonal statistics

Top scorers

Season after season, players in the BPL compete for the golden boot title, which is awarded at the end of each season to the top scorer throughout the entire season. The most recent winner of the golden boot is Souleymane Diabate, who won the golden boot at the end of the 2021–22 season after scoring 21 goals. Raphael Odovin Onwrebe is both currently the holders of the most golden boot titles with two golden boots. The five Nigerians make up the six golden boots won by Nigerians, the most of any nationality in the league. While to date

Enamul Haque Inam-ul-Haq ( ar, إنعام الحـــق ), meaning ''Gift of the Truth'', is a masculine Islamic given name.). Notable bearers of the name include; Cricketers * Inam-ul-Haq (Lahore cricketer) (born 1943), Pakistani cricketer *Enamul Haque ( ...

remains the only local golden boot winner, claiming the award in 2009–10.

Bangladeshi top scorers

Records

All-time top scorers

Appearances

''Italics'' denotes players still playing professional football,
Bold denotes players still playing in the Bangladesh Premier League.

Awards

Player of the Season

Young Player of the Season

Sponsorship

Media coverage

132 matches of season 2015–2016 were broadcast live at

BTV World BTV World ( bn, বিটিভি ওয়ার্ল্ড) is a Bangladeshi Bengali-language satellite and cable television channel owned by the state-owned Bangladesh Television. It began operations on 11 April 2004 via the AsiaSat 3 satell ...

and Boishakhi TV, also live commentary was produced by Radio Next FM. Every match of this league has been streaming live o
BFF's page
of

Mycujoo MyCujoo was a video streaming platformPaul Nicholson"AFC rolls out live streaming platform as media and marketing workshops gather pace" ''Inside World Football'', 29 July 2016. providing live and on-demand broadcast of football matches, sports ...

platform from 2018 to 2019 season.

Bangla TV Bangla TV ( bn, বাংলা টিভি) is a Bengali-language satellite television channel based in the United Kingdom and Bangladesh. It was established in the United Kingdom on 16 September 1999, targeting Bengali audiences both there an ...

started broadcasting selected matches of the BPL 2018–19 matches live from 9 May 2019. The first sports channel of Bangladesh

T sports T Sports, also referred to as Titas Sports, is a Bangladeshi Bengali-language sports oriented television channel owned by East West Media Group, a subsidiary of Bashundhara Group. It is Bangladesh's first television channel dedicated to sports ...

started to broadcast the matches of BPL 2020–21 from 13 January 2021.

Stadiums

BPL clubs in Asia

Continental qualification

Bangladesh Premier League teams can qualify for the top Asian club competitions – the AFC Champions League qualifying play-offs and

AFC Cup The AFC Cup is an annual continental club football competition organised by the Asian Football Confederation (AFC). Under its current rules, the competition is played primarily between clubs from nations that did not receive direct qualifying s ...

– through their performance in the league. Before the

2012–13 1 (one, unit, unity) is a number representing a single or the only entity. 1 is also a numerical digit and represents a single unit of counting or measurement. For example, a line segment of ''unit length'' is a line segment of length 1. I ...

season Bangladeshi clubs were only allowed entry to the now defunct

AFC President's Cup The AFC President's Cup was an annual international association football competition between domestic clubs sides run by the Asian Football Confederation (AFC) held between 2005 and 2014. The competition targeted emerging football nations, and wa ...

, which was a competition targeted for emerging football nations. Since the 2021–22 season the league winners are allowed entry to the qualifying play-offs of the

AFC Champions League The AFC Champions League (abbreviated as ACL) is an annual continental club football competition organised by the Asian Football Confederation, and contested by Asia's top-division football clubs. It is the most prestigious club competition ...

Abahani Limited Dhaka Abahani Limited Dhaka ( bn, ঢাকা আবাহনী লিমিটেড), also referred as Dhaka Abahani or Abahani Limited, is a Bangladeshi professional Association football, football club based in the Dhanmondi area of Dhaka, Ban ...

was the first Bangladesh Premier League club to club to play in Asian competition when they participated in the

2008 AFC President's Cup The 2008 AFC President's Cup was the fourth edition of the AFC President's Cup, a competition for football clubs in countries categorized as "emerging nations" by the Asian Football Confederation. For this edition, the tournament was extended fro ...

. The club qualified for the competition, after winning the first edition of the league in

. The first six seasons of the league Bangladeshi clubs only participated in the AFC President's Cup, until

Sheikh Russel KC Sheikh Russel KC is a professional football club based in Dhaka, Bangladesh, currently playing in the Bangladesh Premier League. The club has won the Federation Cup in 2012, which was their first major title. They also won their maiden Banglad ...

the winners of the

league season were given entry 2015 AFC Cup qualifying play-off. The winners of the 2013–14 season of the league

Sheikh Jamal Dhanmondi Club ) , founded = , dissolved = , ground = Sheikh Fazlul Haque Mani Stadium , capacity = 5,000 , owntitle = , owner = , mgrtitle = Head Coach , coach = Maruful Haque , chairman = Safwan Sobhan Tasvir , league = Bangladesh Premier Leagu ...

, were the first Bangladeshi club to be given direct entry into the AFC Cup, during the

2016 AFC Cup The 2016 AFC Cup was the 13th edition of the AFC Cup, Asia's secondary club football tournament organized by the Asian Football Confederation (AFC). Al-Quwa Al-Jawiya defeated Bengaluru FC in the final to win their first AFC Cup title, becoming ...

. On July 2022, it was confrimed that

Bashundhara Kings Bashundhara Kings ( bn, বসুন্ধরা কিংস) is a professional football team based in Bashundhara Residential Area, Dhaka, Bangladesh. They clinched the title of the 2017 Bangladesh Championship League, the second tier of th ...

, the winners of the 2021–22 league season will partake in the AFC Champions League Play-off round, while holding an automatic place in the

group stages if they are unable to advance past the play-offs. Meanwhile the runner-up of the league will take part in the qualifiers of the AFC Cup or will directly qualify for the competition if the league winners advance past the AFC Champions League play-offs. The leagues third place team along with the

Federation Cup Federation Cup or Fed Cup is the former name of the premier world team competition in women's tennis. Federation Cup may also refer to: * Capital Football Federation Cup, an Australian territory-based association football tournament *Federation Cup ...

champions, will remain standby for the AFC Cup Play-off round if the league winners succeed to qualify for the AFC Champions League main stage. Updated on 5 October 2022
(Source)

BPL clubs in AFC tournament

Defunct

Competitions previously run by AFC include:

References

External links

Bangladesh Premier League
at FIFA.com
Bangladesh Premier League
at soccerway.com {{AFC Leagues 1

Sports leagues established in 2007 2007 establishments in Bangladesh Professional sports leagues in Bangladesh