Dhaka, Bangladesh: The Bangabandhu Cup Golf Bangladesh Open, one of the Asian Tour’s emerging tournaments with huge growth potential, will make a welcome return to the schedule this season.

The event, which was last staged in 2019, will be played at its regular home Kurmitola Golf Club, in Bangladesh’s capital city Dhaka, from November 24-27 and will offer a purse of US$400,000.

The tournament was postponed in 2020 and 2021 because of the Covid-19 pandemic but will now be staged as the penultimate event of the season and will play a key role in helping to determine the winner of the Asian Tour Order of Merit title.

The tournament has the reputation of providing breakthrough wins for the next generation of Asian Tour stars such as Thai Sadom Kaewkanjana, who triumphed in the tournament three years ago, for his maiden success on the Asian Tour.

In 2017, his compatriot Jazz Janewattananond also lifted his first Asian Tour trophy there, kick-starting a monumental run which included another five wins and the Asian Tour Order of Merit title in 2019.

Singaporean Mardan Mamat was victorious in 2015, the first year the event was played on the Asian Tour; while Indian Gaganjeet Bhullar and Bangladesh’s most famous golfing son, Siddikur Rahman, triumphed in 2011 and 2010, respectively.

Cho Minn Thant, Commissioner and CEO, Asian Tour, said: “The Bangabandhu Cup Golf Bangladesh Open is an essential part of the Asian Tour schedule so we are delighted it will return this year.

“The tournament presents everything that the Asian Tour is trying to achieve in terms of staging tournaments in new, untapped markets and helping to encourage golf at grass-roots level. It’s a relatively new event with a very bright future.”

It was first played in 2009, as part of the Professional Golf Tour of India, before joining the Asian Tour.

General SM Shafiuddin Ahmed, Chief of Army Staff, Bangladesh Army and President, Bangladesh Golf Federation, said: “We are proud to organise the Bangabandhu Cup Golf Bangladesh Open at Kurmitola Golf Club in the name of ‘The Father of the Nation’ who was a sports loving person.

“After two difficult years when we were unable to stage our national Open, we are overjoyed to see the tournament return during the current calendar year. Bangladesh being a promising golf country is honoured to be able to host such international sporting events on this scale. This Asian Tour event will be a tremendous boost for the game of golf in Bangladesh.”

Siddikur, a two-time winner on the Asian Tour, will once again lead to the local challenge. While his victory in the event happened when it was not part of the Asian Tour, he came close to winning in 2017, finishing runner-up.

Siddikur learned the game as a caddie at Kurmitola Golf Club and has an incredible track record in tournaments there, winning two Asian Development Tour events at the club – the Grameenphone Bangladesh Masters in 2011, and the 2018 City Bank American Express Dhaka Open. Furthermore, he was second there in the Bangladesh Open in 2011 and 2012.