Ronan Sullivan to remain in Bangladesh team for SAFF Championship

US-based striker Ronan Sullivan will play in the Bangladesh national football team in the upcoming SAFF Championship. Vice-president of the Bangladesh Football Federation (BFF) Fahad Karim has confirmed the matter.

The 15th edition of the SAFF Championship will start in Dhaka on November 5. Looking ahead to the tournament, Fahad spoke with journalists at the BFF building on Thursday. He informed that Ronan will join the national team from November 1. It is being hoped that the long-standing striker crisis in the national team will ease somewhat due to this.

Ronan had played for Bangladesh in the SAFF Under-20 Championship held in the Maldives last April. He made an important contribution on the way to winning the title. Bangladesh became champions by defeating India 4-3 in the tiebreaker in the final with his goal. Earlier this young striker had also scored a brace against Pakistan.

Overcoming the uncertainty regarding Ronan’s joining the national team, Fahad Karim said, “Ronan has confirmed today that he is joining us from November 1. The last time for team registration for SAFF is November 18. Therefore, he will remain included in our main team.”

Bangladesh will start the campaign with a match against Bhutan at the National Stadium on the opening day of SAFF. After that the hosts will face Sri Lanka in the last match of the group stage at the same venue on November 11.

However, the international FIFA window will start on November 9. As a result, the possibility of getting expatriate footballers like Hamza Chowdhury and Shamit Shome at the beginning of the tournament is low. Clubs are not bound to release players for the national team before the start of the FIFA window.

Recently the performance of Bangladesh in the FIFA ASEAN Cup was disappointing. After defeats to Malaysia and Singapore, the team also lost by a big margin against Indonesia. After that chief coach of the national team Thomas Dooley had urged taking more expatriate footballers into the team for the SAFF Championship.