Several celebrities, including cricketers, have been engaging with fans via live chat sessions in social media amid the nationwide coronavirus lockdown that has forced everyone to stay indoors. Opening batsman Murali Vijay recently conducted one such session, wherein he revealed whom he wished to take out for dinner if he could.

When he was asked to choose two cricketers he wished to dine with, Murali Vijay took the names of Australian women's cricket team's Ellyse Perry, the number 1 all-rounder in ODIs and international women’s cricketer of the year, and his fellow teammate Shikhar Dhawan. "Ellyse Perry. I want to have dinner with her. She is so beautiful. And Shikhar Dhawan any day. He is a fun guy. Just that he will speak Hindi and I will be conversing in Tamil," Murali Vijay had mentioned. In an Instagram Live session with Ridhima Pathak, Ellyse Perry responded to the same, stating that she was hoping he would pay for the dinner. "I hope he's paying. That’s very kind of him. I'm flattered," Perry said. Regarding the long-lasting impact Covid-19 is bound to have on cricket organizations, Perry mentioned, "Sport, in general, is resilient and I can't actually see it having a long-lasting negative effect. It's certainly made organizations rethink how they run their sports and their codes and potentially strip it back to what is really important." She further added, "That's not necessarily a bad thing. I don't think it's going to affect women's sport. It's become so apparent that if you want all your population engaging in your code you need to engage all the population. And part of that is having women's involvement."

Meanwhile, Murali Vijay was all set to take part in the 13th edition of IPL with the Chennai Super Kings, but the tournament has been suspended due to the pandemic. The opener last played for India at Perth in 2018.