Durbar Rajshahi's Overseas Players Stuck in Dhaka as Franchise Fails to Pay Dues

The Bangladesh Premier League (BPL) team Durbar Rajshahi is struggling with serious financial and management issues throughout the season. The foreign players of Durbar Rajshahi are struck in their team hotel in Dhaka. The five overseas players haven't received their full payments and the team owner and management are not responding to their concerns about this issue.

The local players of Rajshahi also not getting paid on time because of their poor management made many things worse in the BPL 2025. Rajshahi was knocked out of the Bangladesh Premier League (BPL) on Saturday after the Khulna Trigers defeated Dhaka Capitals on the last day of the league stage.

The overseas players of Durbar Rajshahi Ryan Burl, Mohammad Haris, Mark Deyal, Miguel Cummins, and Aftab Alam are still waiting for full payments. Some players have received only 25% of their payment, while others haven't been paid at all.

Rajshahi’s Financial Issues Spark Controversy

Update from Asif Mahmud’s best BPL ever:
•Durbar Rajshahi’s official page disappeared.
•Team management is unresponsive.
•Team owner is unreachable.
•Foreign players are still waiting for their payments and flight tickets.

Don’t be surprised if the team owner has already… pic.twitter.com/42XJ9EwepZ

— Taskin Wahed Akash (@taskinakash71) February 2, 2025

The local player of Durbar Rajshahi, Anamul Haque said that the Bangladeshi players didn't receive any payments before the tournament began. Last month in Chattogram, local players refused to attend a training session, and overseas players were refused to play the matches. Later, Haris and Burl decided to play for the team's playoff hopes alive, but they didn't qualify for playoffs due to a low net run rate.

The owner of Durbar Rajshahi, Shafique Rahman has also faced payment trouble outside the team as he failed to pay the hotel bills on time and the hotel seized his car for not paying their bills.

Nazmul Abedeeb Fahim a member of BPL's governing council mentioned that the Bangladesh Cricket Board (BCB) had not checked the financial status of Durbar Rajshahi before approving it as a franchise. He said “We didn’t evaluate the franchises properly. We didn’t verify their experience and financial strength. Now, we are facing the consequences.”

The Bangladesh sports adviser Asif Mahmud spoke to the Rajshahi owner Rahman and warned him about the situation. Mahmud said. "I spoke to the Rajshahi owner, and he assured us that he will clear the payments, I made it clear that if he fails, we will take legal action. Our fact-finding committee will investigate how this team was even allowed to participate."

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