Mumbai, Aug 30 (IANS): Premier Futsal on Tuesday announced that the second season of the football league will be played in the first quarter of 2017 with eight franchises participating across four cities.

The Premier Futsal management also made their intentions to host the league bi-annually from next year onwards, according to a release.

Premier Futsal's first season was held in India earlier this year.

It saw former football stars Ronaldinho, Paul Scholes and Ryan Giggs, Hernan Crespo and Michel Salgado play in the tournament.

"We managed to get the biggest marquee players to our country for Premier Futsal and the fans in the stadium and those watching it on TV thoroughly enjoyed the experience. We are confident about what we are doing and therefore have decided to make Premier Futsal a bi-annual property," Xavier Britto, Premier Futsal chairman said in the release.

"Riding on the success of Season One, we will go back to our plan of playing with 8 franchises and all the international futsallers will go under the hammer for Season Two. We will be announcing the processes and auction dates over the course of the next one month."

"We are humbled and thank the Indian government's support for allowing Premier Futsal to introduce a new sport to the country and with their support, we wish to grow Futsal from strength to strength here," Britto added.

The second edition of the league will see eight franchises divided in two groups to battle it across four venues to make it to the final.

The two new franchises will be assigned marquee international football players, six international and five Indian players each.