Piyush Chawla Names His All Time IPL Playing XI: Indian leg-spinner Piyush Chawla has named his all-time IPL playing XI featuring some of the biggest stars of the league and legends of the sport.
Chawla has been playing in the IPL since the very first season. Having been a part of a strong Kings XI Punjab (Punjab Kings) team in the first season, he stayed with them till 2013, following which he moved to the Kolkata Knight Riders, where he won his first IPL title in 2014.
In 2020, he was bought by the Chennai Super Kings but was bought by the Mumbai Indians the very next season. Piyush is probably the most underrated bowler in league history. Despite being the second-highest wicket-taker in IPL history (with 192 wickets in as many matches), he is not a part of most conversations surrounding the best bowler in league history.
But having played in the IPL since the very beginning, Piyush has not only seen but experienced everything that the league has to offer at this point and thus brings a unique point of view to the conversation of some of the greatest players in league history.
Piyush Chawla recently appeared on Shubhankar Mishra’s Unplugged podcast. When asked to name his all-time league XI, these are the players he named.
Piyush Chawla Names His All-Time IPL Playing XI
The first two names on his list were Virat Kohli and Rohit Sharma. Two of the highest run scorers in the league. Not only are these two the biggest and best batters in international cricket over the past decade, but they also captained the two most popular IPL teams during their golden eras.
Kohli has by far the most runs in the league, 8004 in 252 matches to be exact. He also has the most centuries with eight and has two Orange Caps. On the other hand, Rohit is the most successful IPL captain with five titles as the Mumbai Indians skipper and has the third most runs with 6628.
Piyush next named Suryakumar Yadav, who himself has emerged into an IPL legend in his own right. Having played for two of the most successful teams in the league, the Mumbai Indians and KKR, he is the quintessential middle-order IPL batter; he has played a massive role in several MI title wins and is now the No. 1 ranked T20I batter in the world. He has scored 3594 runs in 150 games and a strike rate of over 145.
The other two batters in Chawla’s team were Royal Challengers Bengaluru legends Chris Gayle and AB de Villiers. Gayle might be the greatest IPL opener of all time. Known for his ability to cause utter destruction, he still holds the record for the highest individual record in the league of 175, which he scored against the Pune Warriors India in 2013. With two Orange Caps under his belt. He has 4965 runs in 142 games and is the third-highest-scoring overseas player in league history.
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Meanwhile, AB de Villiers is the second-highest-scoring overseas player in the league with 5162 runs in 14 games. Mr. 360 was the most exciting player to watch when he was in song and was also a spark while fielding.
MS Dhoni is the wicketkeeper of this team. Thala is the joint-most successful captain in IPL history alongside Rohit Sharma, with five titles. He played a big role in CSK being the most successful IPL team for the longest time. One of the best finishers in the game, the 43-year-old has scored 5243 runs in 264 games. He also has the most dismissals for a keeper in the league with 190.
The two all-rounders and spinners in Piyush Chawla’s team are Yuvraj Singh and Sunil Narine. Yuvraj is an absolute legend of Indian cricket, having been the hero of two World Cup wins. He was also one of the biggest names in the first decade of the IPL. While he never managed to win the league or perform at the level he was capable of in the IPL, he still scored 2771 runs and took 36 wickets in 132 games.
On the other hand, Sunil Narine might be the most impressive all-rounder in the IPL. Having started his career as a No. 11 batter, after becoming one of the best bowlers in the league, he was brought up to open KKR’s batting, a role in which he prospered. As recently as 2024, he was made an opener once again and played a major role in the Knight Riders’ third IPL win with the bat and the bowl. While he has 1534 runs in 177 matches with a strike rate of 165, he is also the fifth-highest wicket-taker in the league with 180 wickets.
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As for the two pacers, Piyush picked nothing but the best in Lasith Malinga and Jasprit Bumrah. Arguably the two best bowlers in league history and the reasons behind MI’s prolonged success. Malinga was probably the best T20I bowler of his day. From powerplay wickets to clutch death over bowling, he could do anything. Known for his devastating yorkers, the Sri Lankan legend was the highest wicket-taker in the IPL for the longest time but has now fallen eighth. But he still has the best wicket-to-match ratio in the top 10, taking 170 wickets in just 122 games.
Then comes Malinga’s successor, Jasprit Bumrah. At the time of writing, Bumrah is most likely the best all-format cricketer in the world. An absolutely lethal bowler in his day, Bumrah was the best bowler in IPL 2024, taking 20 wickets at an economy below 6.5 in a season where 10+ economies were commonplace. In his IPl career, Bumrah has 165 wickets in 133 games.
Anybody looking at this list would see that Piyush Chawla named only 10 players, because while he did mention having a leg-spinner in the XI, he did not name that player, hinting at himself as the 11th player in the team. The two highest wicket-takers in IPL history are leg-spinners, those being Chawal and Yuzvendra Chahal, who have a whopping 205 wickets in the league.
Piyush Chawla Names His All-Time IPL Playing XI: Rohit Sharma, Chris Gayle, Virat Kohli, AB de Villiers, Suryakumar Yadav, Yuvraj Singh, MS Dhoni, Sunil Narine, Lasith Malinga, Jasprit Bumrah, and a leg spinner.
Check Out: Piyush Chawla Names His All-Time IPL Playing XI
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