As Bangladesh Cricket Board (BCB) successfully organised yet another edition of BPL, there were some matters that came to the fore. One of the issues that were mostly discussed in wrong way was the incident that happened during the second Qualifier game between Rangpur Riders and Comilla Victorians. The rain hampered the proceeding of the match, forcing it to restart in the next day. Comilla later lost the match and was left out before the final despite coming into the knock-out phase as the group leaders.

The defeat wasn’t accepted well by the Comilla fans and owners who went far to term the incident as a conspiracy against them and blamed the governing council and BCB to breach the tournament bylaws.

The BPL governing council also felt that the media couldn’t publish the right picture of the incident and that’s why they came up with the further explanation on this issue even though the tournament was completed.

In a press conference, apart from the BPL governing council chairman Afzalur Rahman Sinha and member secretary Ismail Haider Mallick, senior directors like Mahbub Anam, Enayet Hossain Sriaj, Jalal Yunus, Lokman Hossain Bhuiyan—who are also the part of BPL technical committee—were present.

The directors and governing council rather blamed Comilla Victorians to break the bylaws, saying there was still enough time to hold the match on the scheduled day but Comilla owner took the option to restart the match in the next day.

Director Mahbub Anam showed the copy of the bylaws and said it is clear that according to the bylaws there was enough time to hold Super Over and the players of the two

teams were ready to play but Comilla owner refused it.

“Because he stuck to the matter that the team who came up in the knock out phase with highest points will go through if the play is cancelled. But there was no matter of canceling the game because there was time for super over. The rain stopped at 9 am. The cut off time to start the super over was 9.50. So there was time and the super over should be held according to the bylaws to which the Comilla owners refused,” Anam said.

He also read the clause: “Clause 16.12 of the BPL 2017 Match Playing Conditions  states in regards to Play-off matches - If any of the Eliminator, Qualifier 1 or Qualifier 2 matches are tied, or there is no result--  the relevant teams shall compete in a Super Over to determine which team is the winner of the match in question; and  if conditions do not permit a Super Over within the time available to determine the winner or if the Super Over is tied, then the team which, at the end of the relevant regular tournament, finished in the higher position in the league table will be deemed the winner of the relevant play-off match.”

“But we had the time and we could start a Super Over. However since Comilla owners refuse it, we give them the option of restarting the match in fresh way in the next or from the game where it was finished in the previous day. We did it for the greater interest of the game. It was a favour to them actually. However they chose to restart the game from where it was finished.”