One of the hottest and most talented actors in the South film industry, Dulquer Salmaan has bagged a role opposite Sonam Kapoor in the movie adaptation of Anuja Chauhan’s The Zoya Factor. The film is all set to roll in August this year, reports Mumbai Mirror. For those who don't know, the story of The Zoya Factor is about an advertising professional (Sonam) who turns out to be a lucky charm for the Indian cricket team. She falls in love with the captain of the team (Dulquer) and helps in motivating him for the World Cup.

Interestingly, Abhishek Sharma, the director of the film, went on to confess that he wasn’t too convinced with Dulquer playing the lead in the film until he watched Mani Ratnam’s OK Kanmani trailer. “I knew immediately that this was the boy we were looking for. In the book, Nikhil is from the North but in our film, he hails from the South but speaks good Hindi,” reveals the director, adding that Dulquer is a brilliant actor with expressive eyes and makes a great pair with Sonam. “I later saw parts of Bangalore Days and Comrade in America and was most impressed,” he said in a statement to the tabloid.

“Cricket woven into a rom-com and touching on superstition and luck, it’s an amazing book for a screen adaptation. The book has many layers, characters and tracks, so it took Neha Rakesh Sharma some time to pen a tight screenplay and Pradhuman Singh to write the dialogues. Now, we’ve gone back to Anuja who’s happy with the script to polish it and work on additional dialogues as nobody knows the characters better than her,” informed director.

This is the first time Sonam will be sharing the screenspace with Dulquer. "It's always nice to play vibrant, empowered women. I'm excited that Pooja and Aarti are making this film with me and Abhishek, who is brilliant with actors," said the actress. "I loved the idea and how the book was adapted for the screen. It's a super team and I've known a lot of them for a long time," Dulquer was quoted by the leading daily.

The film will release on April 5, 2019.

(The above story first appeared on LatestLY on Mar 13, 2018 10:07 AM IST. For more news and updates on politics, world, sports, entertainment and lifestyle, log on to our website latestly.com).