Football is one of the most popular sports in Bangladesh, introduced during the late 19th century under British rule, with Dhaka playing a central role in its development.

Domestic football resumed the same year with the Dhaka First Division League, which had existed since before the partition of India and attracted internationally renowned players like Nasser Hejazi and Emeka Ezeugo.

The Swadhin Bangla Football Team was established which played 16 matches in India and was officially received by the BFF in 2009.

[6] The first Dhaka League was won by Bangladeshi club Victoria SC in 1948, three years prior to the Mother Language Movement while still under Pakistani rule.

The late 1950s and 1960s saw, Bengali football starting to earn more popularity among the people, when the clubs took part in the Aga Khan Gold Cup, which was held in Dhaka every year.

The President Gold Cup, was also a popular competition at the time, where clubs and national selected teams from all over Asia participated in.

Although Bangladesh failed to win a single game during the competition, their performances against North Korea and Syria impressed the whole country.

Besides that, Bangladeshi clubs bagged two more titles abroad: Quaid-E-Azam Trophy of Pakistan in 1985 and Jigme Dorji Wangchuk Memorial Football of Bhutan in 2003.

The domestic competitions helped the popularity of footballs skyrocket in the country and 1988 also saw Mohammedan reach the semi-finals of the Asian Club Championship.

This led to both domestic and international football losing popularity among fans and the country falling to the lowest FIFA rank in its history.

Since the start of the decade, the BFF was forced to recruit expatriate players, as the country failed to produce talent due to no development at the grassroots level and an unorganized league structure.

During the AFC Asia Cup 2019 qualification playoff round 2, under Tom Saintfiet, the team suffered its biggest humiliation against Bhutan.

[26] On 26 June 2019, Dhaka Abahani became the first Bangladeshi club to reach the 2019 AFC Cup knock out phase, by defeating Indian side Minarva Punjab 1–0 on aggregate.