Yuzvendra Chahal is face of BCCI interviews for Team India, thank to his desi touch

Indian leg break bowler, Yuzvendra Chahal has become the face of interviews for the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI). A number of cricketers from the team have appeared on what is known as Chahal TV.

The most recent interview by the 29-year-old was of Shreyas Iyer who was the star in India's win during the Caribbean trip. The two discussed the match, Iyer's innings and also had fun talking about their breakfast. There was even a game of dumb charades with Chahal acting out what he thought of the innings. He promised fans that Chahal TV would return in India.



Indian captain, Virat Kohli was interviewed by Chahal after the team's win over West Indies in the second ODI. Chahal has some interesting quips that he makes as he asks questions to his teammates. Like he says, "Breaking news! Virat Kohli gets tired."

The interviews are nice and relaxed, more like a conversation that Chahal has with his fellow players. Whenever, the youngster is in the Indian team, he ensures that he does a few interviews.


Prior to the Kohli interview, KL Rahul was interviewed by Chahal during the World Cup in England. Interestingly, the interviews are only done after India's wins. They tend to be around two to three minutes long with 'Yuzi' as he is lovingly called in many of them by his teammates, literally having a heart to heart.

The flavour that the interviews done in Hindi give to the video makes them seem more like a locker room conversation than a real interview. The questions asked are a nice mix of match related with a dose of fun.


Chahal wears his trademark glasses in all his interviews. The one that featured Jasprit Bumrah has the duo have a full match analysis of MS Dhoni and Virat Kohli in particular. They end with Chahal saying, "Let's meet in Birmingham where we will have chole bhature, Chahal TV will go on." The desi flavour that is added is the USP of the middle over's bowler's interviews.


His interview with Rohit Sharma during the World Cup where the batsman was on fire had a personal touch to it. Chahal gave credit to the batsman's daughter Samaira for his run fest which drew a laugh from the dotting dad. A point to note about Chahal in his interviews is that he uses the names he calls the players by. There is an informal feel to it which is very refreshing. Sharma is unrestrained as he seems to open his heart to Chahal.


The places where the interviews are shot are also varied from the dressing room to the grounds to the stands which adds colour. An interesting video is from the home of Manchester United at Old Trafford's Theatre of Dreams. The love for football of Chahal, Dinesh Karthik and Vijay Shankar is very evident and adds a nice twist to Chahal TV.

This is perhaps the only video where Chahal in the last two month uses English. We could blame the joy of being at the Man U home stadium for that. But the authenticity of the segment still remains as it offers a view of the Indian cricket team letting their hair down.


In his interview, Shikhar Dhawan admits that every Indian cricketer wants to come on Chahal TV which has been around for more than a year now. Yuzvendra Chahal uses his hands a lot while asking questions to his fellow players which suggests the informality of it. He again brings in the personal touch by asking the opening batsman about his wife Ayesha watching the match. The players are very open to speak about their personal life when Chahal asks them about it.


Chahal also did a video with the team's support staff in the team bus in May this year. Indian coach, Ravi Shastri commends the youngster's pure Hindi and asks him to come to the Bombaya Hindi level while interviewing him.



Called the road trip to Cardiff, the two part video that features the Indian cricket team players has many moods of the superstars. Chahal shows off his PUBG partners in it that includes Mohammed Shami and Bumrah. There is even a cameo by MS Dhoni who Chahal says if he interviews he will be beaten up.


Most of the videos are shot by Rajal Arora, the senior producer of BCCI TV. The BCCI tweets them with interesting headlines which in turn is then tweeted by Chahal from his personal handle.


A few of Chahal's videos are also on his website but it has not been updated since March this year. The videos on the site include interviews with Indian cricketer who topped the batswomen's ranking Smriti Mandhana, all-rounder Kedar Jadhav, young cricketers Shubman Gill, Khaleel Ahmed and Kuldeep Yadav, among others.