In a non-surprising turn of events, the top order’s performance of the Indian cricket team has been…quite interesting, to put it subtly. Ranging from the much-needed exclusion of ‘Selectors’ Favorite’, KL Rahul to Jisshu winning the ‘Best Batsman’ award for his spectacular innings in the Celebrity Cricket League, honestly got us thinking- What if we were to replace the ‘extraordinary’ players with the rising stars of Celebrity Cricket League. 

For those who don’t know, the Celebrity Cricket League (CCL) is an amateur men’s cricket league in India. It is made up of eight teams of actors from eight major regional Indian film studios. In 2011, the league was established. Since 2011, Salman Khan has served as the Celebrity Cricket League’s brand ambassador for all seasons. The CCL teams play their home games at a variety of venues, which are extensively covered in Indian media.

The CCL, which has franchises in major Indian cities, was inspired by the Indian Premier League’s popularity. CCL’s founder and managing director is Hyderabad-based entrepreneur Vishnu Vardhan Induri. In 2010, he launched the league by acquiring the franchise rights to four teams for the inaugural season.

Now, we take our chances at improvement changes pretty seriously, so here’s a potential list of replacements, that we think would fit our “Indian Stars”- 

1.  KL Rahul with Manoj Tiwari (Bhojpuri Dabangs)

The first player on this list is KL Rahul. KL Rahul hasn’t had a great year overall, even though the right-handed batsman has hit some good runs this year. KL Rahul played 26 games in 2022 across all three formats and held an average of just 28.57.

In ODIs, he arrived at the midpoint of only 32.71 in 8 Tests with 2 half-centuries. He only managed to score 80 runs in two Test matches. In 2022, he scored 434 runs in 16 games and averaged 28.93 in T20Is. As a result, he did not achieve a 35-plus average in any format this year, which puts him far behind his potential.

Considering KL Rahul has been deemed to be the ‘selectors’ favorite’ by fans for quite some time, we think Manoj Tiwari can be a good replacement. No, no, this isn’t a random assumption! The multi-talented and famous singer and BJP MP had recently led his team Bhojpuri Dabangs to a thrilling win against Sonu Sood’s Punjab De Sher by 25 runs. Who knows, the Selectors may gain a new favorite too!

2. Cheteshwar Pujara with Vikranth (Chennai Rhinos)

Another participant on this list is Chetshwar Pujara. Pujara is a specialist batsman for Tests. This year, he played in three Test matches but only managed to score 187 runs in six innings at an average of 31.16. In spite of the fact that Pujara hit 2 half-centuries, he failed to come up with a century.

As a Test specialist batsman, Pujara is anticipated to produce outstanding performances in the longest format. However, his batting average in the 30s this year was largely unsuccessful.

Vikrant has a strike rate of 154.95 with an average of 70.5 and in the latest tweet by CCL, he has been deemed “the true hero” while he was out there in the middle, playing with a hamstring tear. You’d tell us it’s not much, but at least Vikrant has a century in his bag.

3. Shreyas Iyer with Uattam Tiwari (Bhojpuri Dabanggs)

Since 2023, Indian middle-order batter Iyer has struggled with injuries. He missed the three-match ODI series against New Zealand due to a back physical issue. He will not play in the first Test against Australia because of a similar injury. He has played seven Tests for India so far, scoring 624 runs in 12 innings at an average of 56.73. ESPNCricinfo reports that Iyer has been instructed to spend more time in rehab by officials at the National Cricket Academy (NCA).

Given that Iyer is just so prone to injuries, we think it’s best to let him rest and be replaced and we think Uattam Tiwari would be a great fit! Yes, we know that Iyer still has better numbers than the rest, but Bhojpuri Dabanggs’ Tiwari has a strike rate of 170.00 and an average of 102.0. With all humor intact, we think Tiwari might as well fill the gap left by Iyer’s injuries.

4. Virat Kohli with Raja Bherwani (Mumbai heroes)

Team India requires a batter who can start at number three due to the increasing frequency of former captain Virat Kohli and Rohit Sharma’s absences from the shorter format of the game. 

Virat’s dry spell had put everyone in major concern and his comeback albeit short had lifted spirits but looks like our Kohli is gradually diving back into the deep end, yet again.

So in his absence opened up yet another chance for replacement and Raja Bherwani of Mumbai Heroes might be able to keep up with his average of 118.0. 

In the recent match against Australia, Virat got off to a strong start and appeared fully prepared to lead India.

However, Australia’s Matthew Kuhnemann caught him LBW while he was batting on 13. Kohli attempted a pull shot on a delivery that skidded but completely missed the line. Despite the fervent celebrations of the Australian players, he declined the review.

Although Kohli’s numbers in short formats are arguably good, his long formats are quite concerning and we think, selectors should look the other way to save us from any more upcoming heartaches. 

5. Jasprit Bumrah with Bobby Deol

Despite Jasprit Bumrah’s occasional good performance, the fast bowler is too fast to defeat injuries, as we have almost lost count of how many matches he had to miss because of it. Bumrah’s highest speed to be recorded so far stands at 153.36 kph. Starting from a thumb injury in 2018 to a back injury in 2022, Bumrah’s injury streaks are significantly higher than his bowling ones. 

We (and other twitteratis) can think of a wonderful replacement- Bollywood star Bobby Deol. His recent performances with the ball have absolutely convinced us that Bumrah can finally get the rest he needs to properly heal all injuries he has sustained. 

Don’t get us wrong, we love Bumrah, we just feel the poor lad needs to heal and who better than Lord Bobby Deol to save the day?

The Celebrity Cricket League (CCL) 2023 will get underway from February 18. The cricketing extravaganza will witness eight teams from eight regional Indian cinema in action over a course of one-month. The CCL 2023 final will be played in Hyderabad on March 19.

The league started in 2011 to bring in sports and entertainment together. A total of 19 matches will be played during the tournament. Mumbai Heroes, Karnataka Bulldozers, Chennai Rhinos, Telugu Warriors, Kerala Strikers, Bengal Tigers, Punjab de Sher, and Bhojpuri Dabbangs are the eight teams competing in CCL 2023. 

Prominent actors like Ritesh Deshmukh will feature for Mumbai Heroes while Sunil Shetty, Bobby Deol, and few other bollywood celebrities will also be showcasing their cricketing prowess. Two well-known South Asian athletes, Kichcha Sudeep and Akhil Akkineni, will also compete in CCL 2023.

The venues of the CCL 2023 matches are Jaipur, Hyderabad, Raipur, Jodhpur, Bengaluru, and Thiruvananthapuram.

Where to watch the CCL 2023 matches?

The Celebrity Cricket League’s broadcasting rights have been purchased by Zee Entertainment. As a result, India’s cricket fans may watch the live broadcast of the CCL T20 tournament in 9 different languages and on 9 separate channels.

Zee Anmol Cinema – Hindi
& Pictures – English
Zee Thirai – Tamil
Zee Cinemalu – Telugu
Zee Picchar – Kannada
Flowers TV – Malayalam
PTC Punjabi – Punjabi
Zee Bangla Cinema – Bangla
Zee Biskope – Bhojpuri

The Zee5 app will offer live coverage of the Celebrity Cricket League in 2023. The Celebrity Cricket League YouTube page will have highlights of the CCL 2023 matches available for viewers as well.

What is the schedule for CCL 2023?

CCL 2023: Squads, Captains, Sponsors

Karnataka Bulldozers

Pradeep, Rajeev H, Sudeep Kiccha, Suneel Rao, Jayram Karthik, Prathap, Prasanna, Shiva Rajkumar, Ganesh, Krishna, Sourav Lokesh, Chandan, Arjun Yogi, Nirup Bhandari, Nanda Kishore, and Sagar Gowda.

Bhojpuri Dabbangs

Manoj Tiwari, Ravi Kishan, Vikrant Singh, Aditya Ojha, Asgar Khan, Ayaz Khan, Jay Yadav, Vikas Singh Virappan, Ajhoy Sharma, Shailesh Sinha, Dinesh Lal Yadav, Parvesh Lal Yadav, Uday Tiwari, Anshuman Singh Rajpoot, Khesari Lal Yadav, Vikas Jha, Baivaw Rai, and Sudhir Singh.

Bengal Tigers

Uday, Indrasish, Mohan, Suman, Joy, Joe, Yusuf, Jeetu Kamal, Jammy, Ratnadip Ghosh, Ananda Chowdhury, Sandy, Aditya Roy Banerjee, Arman Ahamed, Manty, Rahul Mazumdar, Gaurav Chakrabarty, Boney, and Sourav Das.

Mumbai Heroes

Suniel Shetty, Aftab Shivdasani, Sohail Khan, Bobby Deol, Jay Bhanushali, Saqib Saleem, Shabir Ahluwalia, Raja Bherwani, Sharad Kelkar, Apoorva Lakhia, Sameer Kochar, Sidhant Muley, Madhav Deochake, Freddie Daruwala, Vatsal Sheth, Adarsh Balakrishna, Rajniesh Dugali, Nishant Dahiya, Navdeep Tomar, Sandeep Juwatkar, Jatin Sarna, and Amit Sial.

Chennai Rhinos

Arya, Vishnu Vishal, Jiiva, Vikranth, Shantanu, Prithivi, Ashok Selvan, Kalai Arasan, Mirchi Shiva, Bharath Niwas, Ramana, Satya, Dasarathan, Sharan, Aadhav, and Balasaravanan.

Kerala Strikers

Kunchacko Boban, Asif Ali, Rajeev Pillai, Unni Mukundam, Arjun Nandakumar, Indrajit Sukumaran, Siddharath Menon, Manikuttan, Vijay Yesudas, Shafeeq Rahman, Vivek Gopan, Saiju Kurup, Vinu Mohan, Nikhil K Menon, Prajod Kalabhavan, Antony Pepe, Jean Paul Lal, Sanju Shivaram, Siju Wilson, and Prashanth Alexander.

Punjab de Sher

Sonu Sood, Jimmy Shergil, Ayushmann Khurrana, Gurpreet Ghuggi, Binnu Dhillon, Jassie Gill, Rahul Dev, Gavie Chahal, Dev Kharoud, Gulzar Chahar, Babbal Rai, Aryaman Sapru, Navraj Hans, Yuvraj Hans, Mukul Dev, Arjan Bajwa, and Harmeet Singh.

Telugu Warriors

Akhil Akkineni, Sachin Joshi, Ashvin Babu, Dharam, Aadarsh, Nanda Kishore, Nikhil, Raghu, Samrat, Taraka Ratna, Tarun, Vishwa, Prince, Sushanth, Khayyum, and Harish.