Officials of Bangladesh Football Federation and Premier Bank pose with the logo of Bangladesh Championship League at the BFF House yesterday. The second tier professional football league starts today. PHOTO: COURTESY

The Premier Bank 2nd Bangladesh Championship League gets underway today at the Bangabandhu National Stadium where eight teams will be fighting it out for two places of the Bangladesh Premier League.
Farashganj SC, who were relegated from the Bangladesh Premier League last season, will start their bid to return to the top flight by taking on Chittagong Abahani in the opening match.
Apart from Farashganj, Chittagong Abahani, Rahmatganj MFS, and Dhaka United SC, formerly known as Beanibazar SC, will be trying to get back to the top-tier but will have to face some challenge from other four teams - Victoria SC, Wari Club, Uttar Baridhara Club and Agrani Bank SC, who are also considered good sides regarding their last season's results.
“This time the clubs have found a lot of players from the Senior Division League, Pioneer League and BFF Development program and we hope the league will be very competitive like ongoing Bangladesh Premier League,” said BFF senior vice president Abdus Salam Murshedy at a press conference at the BFF House yesterday.
Except for Chittagong Abahani, all seven clubs selected Birshreshtha Shaheed Mostafa Kamal Stadium in Kamalapur as their home venue as the league will be run on home and away basis.
Salam informed that top two finishers of the league will be promoted to the Bangladesh Premier League while one team will be relegated to their respective league they came from.
Sponsors Premier Bank will provide Tk 20 lakh, all of which will be distributed among the participating teams.
According to the BFF calendar, the Bangladesh Championship League was supposed to be completed by February 25, but the BFF deferred the league numerous times citing different reasons.