An auction was underway in a franchise tournament, yet in the middle of live bidding, someone stepped in to explain the rules. In the landscape of modern cricket, scenes like this feel almost surreal. The auctioneer announced a player, removed him midway, brought up the next name, and was publicly corrected. Meanwhile, two senior players who went unsold were not downgraded to the lower category as the rules require. Officials argued that doing so would be disrespectful.
All of this unfolded on Sunday during the players’ auction for the twelfth edition of the Bangladesh Premier League. The event was scheduled to begin at 4 pm, but did not start until nearly an hour later. All six franchises arrived ready to assemble their squads, yet their fumbling and confusion made the process resemble a puzzle with half its pieces missing.
This disarray came despite the governing council holding a full dummy auction the previous day at the BCB media centre. Franchise representatives were briefed on every detail. When the real auction began, however, the opposite of preparedness was evident. Teams struggled to calculate how many players they were required to pick from each category and how to maintain balance within their squads.
Rajshahi Warriors coach Hannan Sarkar even took the microphone during proceedings to lecture the room on the rules. This happened despite the auctioneer and governing council officials being present and responsible for running the event.
Yet even with that intervention, clarity did not follow. Each franchise needed to sign at least two players from categories A and B combined. That requirement created widespread confusion. At one point, many assumed that Chattogram Royals had already fulfilled their quota, although they had not. Noakhali Express capitalised on that lapse and picked up Zakir Ali Anik and Mahidul Islam at their base price of 35 lakh taka.
Category B carried a base price of 35 lakh, and the most striking names to go unsold initially were Mahmudullah Riyad and Mushfiqur Rahim. No team bid for them in the first round, but both were presented again later. Before they returned to the table, Rangpur Riders CEO and BCB director Ishtiaque Sadeque requested that their base price remain intact. He argued that Mushfiqur and Mahmudullah had served the national team with honour for many years and that lowering their category would be disrespectful. He urged the room to agree.
The rulebook stated that any player left unsold in the first round must be downgraded when called again. By that instruction, Mushfiqur and Mahmudullah should have been moved to category C. Instead, the rule was set aside and the process altered entirely to keep them in their original bracket. The same exception was extended to Mominul Haque and Nasir Hossain, who were also picked on a second call, yet retained their initial base prices.
Additional inconsistencies marred the proceedings. For categories D through F, bids were supposed to increase by 50 thousand taka at a time, but the auctioneer raised increments by one lakh instead, saying it was done to save time. There were moments when bids continued even after the hammer had fallen to declare a player sold or unsold. At one stage, while Parvez Hossain Emon’s bidding was still in progress, the auctioneer inadvertently called up Tanzim Hasan Sakib, who was next in line.
Every year, the BPL manages to produce controversy, most often for the wrong reasons. This year’s auction mismanagement appears to follow the same pattern. Otherwise, it is difficult to understand why, after reviving the auction format for the first time in a decade, the league would allow such needless disorder to define the day.
