The Actor’s Cricket Bash 2024 season proved to be a platform for actors and influencers from the entertainment industry to showcase their cricketing skills in a professional set-up.
The Actor’s Cricket Bash was launched in 2019 in Mumbai to bring together actors from entertainment communities and serve as an integrated platform of entertainment, sports, and business.
The league was started in T20 format with four teams but was quickly changed to T10 format to accommodate the busy schedule of the actors. This year, with 6 teams and 100 participants, the league spanned over seven days amounting to 38 hours of live cricket action.
Dilip Agrawal, a seasoned professional with over three decades of experience in investment banking and sports management, conceptualized the Actor’s Cricket Bash.”Here I am trrying to showcase that these guys play serious cricket. There’s technology involved, live telecast of matches and most importantly, the players are technically sound.”
Salil Ankola, the ex-India cricketer and former national selector said, “Dilip, me and Shabir Ahluwalia formed a celebrity cricket team Boxy Boyz in 2002 or ’03. We started playing matches, participated in social and charity causes. From there, we started developing the idea of an all-actors professional tournament. We all thought but Dilip is the man behind successfully launching and taking forward this Actor’s Cricket Bash.”
This year the six teams- Chandigarh Mavericks, Delhi Titans, Ahmedabad Lions, Chennai Marvels, Mumbai Aces and Varanasi Warriors- played 15 matches against each other in the league stage.
The first qualifier was played between Chandigarh Mavericks and Ahmedabad Lions. Batting first, the Lions scored 105/6 in 10 overs. Chasing a competitive total, the Mavericks played aggresively to score 110/0 in 7 overs, defeating the Lions by 10 wickets.
In the eliminator match, Delhi Titans scored 121/6 in 10 overs by batting first. In response, Varanasi Warriors scored only 93/5 to lose the battle by 28 runs.
Ahmedabad Lions got a second chance in the second qualifier against Delhi Titans. However, the Titans continued their good run by defeating the Lions by 35 runs. Delhi Titans scored 107/4 in 10 overs, while the Ahmedabad lions could only accumulate 72 runs in 10 overs losing 7 wickets.
The final was set between Chandigarh Mavericks and Delhi Titans. The Mavericks were completely outplayed by the Titans. They managed to score only 83 runs in 10 overs. Delhi Titans took only 7.5 overs to surpass the total and won the match by 7 wickets.
