The Bhutan Super League, previously known as the Thimphu League and Bhutan A-Division, was the men's football league in Bhutan. Until 2012, it was the lone national top division. Between 2013 and 2020, it was played as the second division and the qualifier for the Bhutan Premier League.

History

The Thimphu League has taken a number of formats during its history. Initially, the competition was held as a single round-robin group of matches, with all games being held at the national stadium, Changlimithang. In

2001 The September 11 attacks against the United States by Al-Qaeda, which Casualties of the September 11 attacks, killed 2,977 people and instigated the global war on terror, were a defining event of 2001. The United States led a Participants in ...

, the format of football played was very similar to the later set up of a Thimphu league, including Paro taking part in a qualifying contest to join other teams from different

Dzongkhag The Kingdom of Bhutan is divided into 20 districts ( Dzongkha: ). Bhutan is located between the Tibet Autonomous Region of China and India on the eastern slopes of the Himalayas in South Asia. are the primary subdivisions of Bhutan. They ...

s for a genuine national league. However, the main focus of the league has been on Thimpu-based teams. Under its previous name, the A-Division was formally named as such in

, following five years of competition under a different, unknown name between 1996 and 2000 and what appears to have been a one-off competition in 1986. The initial A-Division season, as noted above, consisted of a Thimphu-based qualifying round, followed by an essentially national competition, albeit hosted in

Phuentsholing Phuntsholing, also spelled as Phuentsholing ( dz, ཕུན་ཚོགས་གླིང་), is a border town in southern Bhutan and is the administrative seat of Chukha District. The town occupies parts of both Phuentsholing Gewog and Sampheli ...

. Druk Star broke the domination of Drukpol by winning the A-Division that season. In

2002 File:2002 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: The 2002 Winter Olympics are held in Salt Lake City; Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother and her daughter Princess Margaret, Countess of Snowdon die; East Timor gains East Timor independence, indepe ...

the league continued to include teams from outside of Thimphu, but this time, there were no teams from Gomtu or Samtse, only from

and Paro. By 2003, all non-Thimphu teams had dropped out of the league to be replaced by others from the capital city who contested a single round-robin series of matches. In 2003, a full league pyramid was established in Bhutan, with the A-Division at its head. There were nine A division clubs and nine B division clubs competing in the national league. The Bhutan football federation (BFF) introduced C division clubs, from this year, to participate in the national league. About 12 to 14 C division clubs are thought to have participated. Based on the performance in the national league, the two best teams from C division will from this point be promoted to the B division. Likewise, two B division teams will move up to A division. On the other hand, two weakest teams in each division will be relegated to a lower division. Details are scant for

2004 2004 was designated as an International Year of Rice by the United Nations, and the International Year to Commemorate the Struggle Against Slavery and its Abolition (by UNESCO). Events January * January 3 – Flash Airlines Flight 6 ...

, but it is known that this was the first time that Bhutan submitted an entrant for any

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tournament, with that season's champion,

Transport United Transport United Football Club is a Bhutanese professional football club based in Thimphu that competes in the Bhutan Premier League, the top level of Bhutanese football. The club was founded in 2001 and plays at the Changlimithang Stadium. T ...

being awarded Bhutan's slot in the

2005 AFC President's Cup The 2005 AFC President's Cup was the inaugural season of the AFC President's Cup, a competition for football clubs in countries categorized as "emerging nations" by the Asian Football Confederation. The eight teams that competed were split into tw ...

. This cemented the A-Division's position as the premier football competition in the country and it continued to supply Bhutan's President's Cup entrant until the creation of the National League. The league settled into its Thimpu-focussed home and away set up by

2005 File:2005 Events Collage V2.png, From top left, clockwise: Hurricane Katrina in the Gulf of Mexico; the Funeral of Pope John Paul II is held in Vatican City; "Me at the zoo", the first video ever to be uploaded to YouTube; Eris was discovered in ...

at the latest. This season would see the beginning of the dominance of Transport United, who picked up their second successive title and would go on to win another two to make it four in a row, only bettered by Drukpol's performance prior to the formalisation of the A-Division. However, following their final title in

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, they began to slip down the league table, finishing second in

2008 File:2008 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: Lehman Brothers went bankrupt following the Subprime mortgage crisis; Cyclone Nargis killed more than 138,000 in Myanmar; A scene from the opening ceremony of the 2008 Summer Olympics in Beijing; ...

and spending several seasons in mid-table obscurity before finally being relegated to the B-Division in

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. As Transport United slipped, so Yeedzin were poised to take their place, winning four titles and taking one second place in the next six seasons.

2011 File:2011 Events Collage.png, From top left, clockwise: a protester partaking in Occupy Wall Street heralds the beginning of the Occupy movement; protests against Libyan dictator Muammar Gaddafi, who was killed that October; a young man celebrate ...

, however, was the last edition where the A-Division held the premier spot in Bhutan's football pyramid. In an attempt to spread the popularity of the game around the country, a National League was established. The Division continues in its usual format, but now no longer supplies Bhutan's entrant to the AFC President's Cup. Instead the top teams from the Thimphu League qualify to compete in the National League against several teams from different districts. In 2015 the A-Division was renamed the Thimphu League ( Yanmar Thimphu League for sponsorship reasons), reflecting the National League's position as the preeminent football competition in the country. In 2019, the rebranded second division named Bhutan Super League was introduced, adding clubs outside of Thimphu to its membership. Thimphu League continued to exist as part of the district leagues. The Super League ceased after the 2020 season and was replaced by the qualifying tournament for the Premier League.

List of winners

Performance by club

References

{{AFC second leagues Bhutan Super League Football leagues in Bhutan Sports leagues established in 2001 2001 establishments in Bhutan