PremiumCCL 2024: Karnataka Bulldozers vs Bengal Tigers in Qualifier 1; will the Tigers break the Bulldozers’ unbeatable streak?
CCL 2024: Jisshu Senguptha’s Bengal Tigers have never won against the Karnataka Bulldozers since they began playing the tournament. Is this the year that this changes?
Jisshu Senguptha during CCL 2024
Last Updated: 04.51 PM, Mar 12, 2024
In the 10th Season of the Celebrity Cricket League, the stage of four is not about two straight-forward semi-final matches. The tournament is following the IPL format and doing a qualifier between the top 2 teams, an eliminator between team 3 and 4 and a second qualifier between the loser of the first qualifier and winner of the eliminator. The first qualifier is between the Karnataka Bulldozers and the Bengal Tigers, two teams who’ve played each other in this season already, with the former registering a comprehensive win against Jisshu Sengupta’s Tigers’ squad.
On March 15 at 6.30 pm, the Bulldozers and the Tigers will take the field in Thiruvananthapuram for the final stage of the tournament. While the Bulldozers will head into the match with the group stage victory playing on their minds, the fact that the Tigers’ resounding victories in their other group stage matches pushed them to second place on the points table cannot be ignored. Skipper Jisshu, Rahul Mazumder, Jammy Banerjee, Joy Mukherjee, among others, have shown this season that the Tigers are a team not to be taken lightly.
But then, here’s the thing – the Karnataka Bulldozers have a massive 7-0 advantage in head-to-head contest against the Bengal Tigers, including their group stage match this season. The match against the Bulldozers is the only one the Tigers lost this year so far. The Tigers are much-fancied team this year, what with CCL founder Vishnuvardhan Induri and Mumbai Heroes brand ambassador Salman Khan naming them as the most likely team to win the tournament this season.
In fact, in the 9 seasons of CCL so far, the trophy has gone twice each to the Chennai Rhinos and Bulldozers, four times to the Telugu Warriors and once to the Mumbai Heroes. Vishnu Induri has been saying that the Bengal Tigers may end this ‘south dominance’ at CCL. But then, barring their match against the Telugu Warriors, the Karnataka Bulldozers have been at their A-game and given that they’ve not won the trophy in many years, they will fight tooth-and-nail for a chance to win.
The winner of the March 15 qualifier heads directly to the finale on March 17. All the CCL matches are live-streamed on JioCinema, Doordarshan and Sony Ten 5. A few Star Network channels will also televise the matches with regional commentary, like, for instance, Star Suvarna for Kannada.