The All India Football Federation will reportedly maintain the status quo of the two leagues operating in the country next season. The Indian Super League and the I-League are set to function simultaneously again in 2018-’19 like the 2017-’18 season, according to a report in the Times of India.

IMG-Reliance subsidiary Football Sports Development Limited, which operates the ISL, will also not allow new franchises to be formed this summer, according to the report. This means that East Bengal and Mohun Bagan cannot join the ISL till 2019, when restrictions on the ‘One Club, One City’ rule will be lifted.

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The two clubs were expected to join the ISL this year after picking up the bid documents before the 2017-’18 season started but then refused to pay the Rs 15 crore franchise fee. The ISL had expanded from eight to 10 teams last season, with Bengaluru FC and Jamshedpur FC being the two new teams.

An official involved with the proceedings told the daily, “All the 10 teams in the league have agreed to the financial and technical terms before joining the league. So they might raise valid questions if we include Bagan and East Bengal without their bid documents. We might also run into legal problems. We don’t want that.”

The official added, “Had the two clubs submitted the documents, we could have still thought of a way of including them. But our hands are tied now. We are not going to issue bid documents this year. So it will only be in the 2019-’20 season that these two can think of joining ISL.”

Chennaiyin FC won their second ISL title in 2017-’18, after beating Bengaluru FC in the final. Kushal Das, the AIFF’s general secretary spoke about taking an informed call, “We are still having a lot of discussions with AFC and FIFA. There are contractual issues, financial issues to be looked at. We will then get a report from AFC on how to merge the two leagues. It is better to take a right decision rather than a hasty one. So we are in no rush to merge the two leagues at this stage.”