After the establishment of BFF (Bangladesh Football Federation) in 1972, the national team played their first international match against Thailand in the 1973 Merdeka tournament in Malaysia. After its membership with FIFA in 1974 and the Asian Football Confederation (AFC), the national team participated in the 1980 AFC Asian Cup and the 1986 FIFA World Cup qualifiers. But the nation's best results came at South Asian level where it won the SAFF Championship once and were gold medalists in South Asian Games twice.