Bangladesh Reaching New Delhi Tuesday Morning, Bangladesh to play SAFF championship!!!

The complication regarding visas of five members of the Bangladesh national football team including head coach Nikola Ilievski was finally resolved yesterday, paving the way for the team to take a flight this morning to take part in the SAFF Championship.

The 31-member contingent will fly at 8:35 am for New Delhi through a Bangladesh Biman flight as the seventh edition of the regional football extravaganza involving eight countries will get underway from December 2 at the Jawaharlal Nehru Stadium.

The booters were originally scheduled to leave the country for Kolkata on November 25 to play two practice matches there but the tour had to be cancelled due to visa complications as the Indian High Commission granted visas of the remaining five members of the contingent only yesterday.

The tour of Kolkata was important for Macedonian coach Nikola, who wanted to fine tune his charges through two matches in Kolkata before taking on Pakistan on the opening day of the tournament. But he had to be content with the practice matches his boys played on home soil and the lone match in Malaysia.

“It is a good memory for us that we are leaving the country with a victory we recorded against Sheikh Jamal Dhanmondi Club in our last practice match though it could have been better had we got the opportunities to play two matches in Kolkata,” said coach Nikola.

After the cancellation of the tour of Kolkata, the national side had practice under the floodlights yesterday at the Bangabandhu National Stadium as they will have to play under floodlights in New Delhi.