CCL 2023: Chennai Rhinos beat Mumbai Warriors in their first encounter

The second match on Day 1 of the Celebrity Cricket League 2023 was between the Chennai Rhinos, led by actor Arya and the Mumbai Heroes, led by Riteish Deshmukh. The Mumbai Heroes took the field first to bat and scored 94/2 in response to which, the opening pair of the Rhinos, Vikrant and Ramana, scored 150 for no loss in their stipulated 10 overs. It was literally raining runs.

Trailing by 56 runs, the Mumbai Heroes were able to post another 91/5 runs only in their second innings, after which the Rhinos needed only 36 runs for a win, which they got to comfortably in the third over. While Vikrant’s 80 got him the Man of the Match title, Ramana was adjudged Best Batsman and Ashok Selvan Best Bowler.

Thrilled over this rather one-sided victory, fans are already predicting that Chennai Rhinos will be in the finals. The Kollywood team had won the first two editions of the tournament, and will look at bouncing back to that form. Today’s victory comes again defending champions Mumbai Heroes, who had won the last edition in 2019. Chennai Rhinos had beaten the Karnataka Bulldozers in the 2011 and 2012 finals, after which the Sandalwood team took the trophy home two years in a row, defeating the Telugu Warriors and Kerala Strikers respectively. Thereafter, the Telugu Warriors won CCL back-to-back three years.

When CCL began it was meant to be a T20 format tournament, which was eventually cut down to T10. This year, it is still T20, but in Test format, which each side playing two innings of 10 overs each. The broadcasting partner of the tournament is Zee Network, which is transmitting it to nine different channels. The OTT partner is Zee5, while live telecast is also available on the official YouTube page of CCL.

On Day 2, the Kerala Strikers will take on the Telugu Warriors, followed by the Punjab De Sher vs Bhojpuri Dabanggs match.-