Deepika Padukone may tie knots with Yuvraj Singh in 2 Years

NEW DELHI: This could turn out to be the love story of 2008. 'Mr Sixer' Yuvraj Singh is dating Bollywood's latest heartthrob Deepika Padukone, sources close to the families say.

The sources, however, scotched media reports that the model-turned-actress had been invited to Australia by the cricketer, currently on tour Down Under.

Deepika, they insisted, was in Sydney shooting for Yash Raj Films' next venture being directed by Siddharth Anand of 'Tara Rum Pum' fame, in which she is paired opposite Ranbir 'Saa-wariya' Kapoor.

A friend of the Padukones said, "Deepika is in Australia in her own capacity and the India-Australia Test match just happens to be taking place around the same time. But one thing is sure — Yuvraj and Deepika are dating each other."

Meanwhile, a source close to the Singh family told on Friday, "The two are very close to each other. In two years' time, if things go well, marriage could be on the cards. But right now, both of them are focused on their respective professions."

Incidentally, Deepika will be celebrating her 22nd birthday on Saturday, the crucial fourth day of the ongoing second Test match, and the pair is expected to be together for the occasion.

Earlier, Deepika's name had been linked with India's ODI captain, M S Dhoni. He had even invited the actress for the one-off Twenty20 match against Australia in Mumbai last year.

But lately, she has been seen with the dashing southpaw. Deepika attended Yuvraj's birthday party at Enigma, J W Marriott, on December 12 and that was right after the India-Pakistan Test match in Bangalore, where Yuvi struck a crackling 169.

In November, they were also seen together after the last match of the India-Pakistan one-day series.

The southpaw has run up a string of low scores against Ponting's Australia. In fact, he looked both ungainly and out-of-sorts on Friday, and fell cheaply to Brett Lee for a score of 12.

After India had lost the first Test at Melbourne without much of a fight, Indian team manager Lalchand Rajput was quoted in the media saying that senior players were upset over Yuvraj's attitude. The comments were later denied, both by Rajput and the team management.