Rangpur Riders to go after Shakib again

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DHAKA, Aug 20, 2019 (BSS)-Despite all the earlier players signing is deemed invalid, the Rangpur Riders made it clear that they would go after Shakib Al Hasan once again as they demanded one direct signing of one local cricketer from BPL governing council.

As part of their ongoing discussion with the franchisees ahead of the new season, the governing council on Tuesday sat with Rangpur’s management in which the franchise put their demand.

Earlier on Monday, the governing council sat with Dhaka Dynamites, Khulna Titans and Rajshahi Kings who all agreed to be the part of seventh season of BPL under new agreement. Rangpur also agreed to be the part of BPL-7.

Rangpur recruited Shakib earlier as their most valuable player before the BCB announced new cycle of BPL and subsequently made all previous signings invalid.

”Usually we have one and half months before BPL and 15 days after that. We proposed earlier to keep the activities on throughout the year like IPL,” Rangpur’s CEO Ishtiaque Sadeque said here on Tuesday.

“This issue happened after Shakib’s signing [announcement of new cycle]. If this did not happen, the meeting would happen after one more month. Our advice was that, a team is playing for four years, and for next four years you will need a core. There is some retention policy for the players, we asked for it,” he said.

”There were some fresh signing, board wants to give them. And from now on, there won’t be any Icon player rule. There will a direct signing of local player, we wanted that to be mandatory from the board,” he said.

“Board has said that, we can sign 2-3 foreign players directly that’s why we proposed the board to make a similar rule for one local player. They said to give us the proposal formally, then we will discuss,” he said.

Ishtiaque Sadeque added that they are also thinking of keeping Mashrafe in their set-up though he feels that they are not expecting him to be icon any more.

”Mashrafe is a player of our own. We decided that, if he retires he would not be the Icon player, so according to retention, both Mashrafe-Shakib will play for Rangpur. Mashrafe did not want to be an Icon since last year because he retired from T20Is. So ethically or logically, Mashrafe won’t continue as Icon,” said Sadeque.

”Icon should be someone who is promising and new. Though we know, it’s tough to find out seven Icon players from our country. So now, if Mashrafe retires from one-day, he won’t be an Icon (player). According to our planning, Mashrafe was in retention plan earlier. And now, if board makes a new rule, we can’t do anything. If there is no Icon policy, we will keep him,” he concluded.