Subhechcha Ganguly 
The recently concluded and victorious Champions Trophy campaign for India had an X-factor! A trump card that Gautam Gambir identified at Kolkata Knight Riders, and a spin bowling prodigy who never gave up despite cricket throwing him multiple challenges.
His name is Varun Chakravarthy, and IPL fanatics, have seen him bamboozle oppositions with his variations and finger flickers that have left batsmen wanting.
Life gave Chakravarthy many challenges. He was tipped to play for his state team and had to choose between cricket and architecture. When he was at the cusp of selection, he suffered injuries and felt he would never make it.
However, he never gave up. Having played tennis ball cricket in the streets of Chennai, he found ways to outfox batsmen by looping the ball and using his index and middle fingers to throw in faster deliveries in between those loopy ones.
He played tennis ball cricket for various club teams and companies and made a mockery of the defences of many fabled cricketers. Grapevine has it that when Dinesh Karthik (DK) was with Kolkata Knight Riders, Chakravarthy was called to bowl to players in the nets and he impressed Venky Mysore (One of the Operations Managers), Gautam Gambhir and the entire support staff. In a matter of a year, he was fast-tracked into the team and the rest is history.
Chakravarthy was also part of the 2021 T20 World Cup campaign, under Virat Kohli, but his nerves got the better of him. He wasn’t able to replicate his IPL form into International Cricket and international batsmen began picking his variations. In a matter of a year, he was dropped and wasn’t part of the national team reckoning.
However, a player with a goal is indeed unstoppable! Over the next few years, he worked on his fitness, and fielding and added many more tricks in his bag. As an unorthodox spinner, he added leg spin variations and developed multiple stock deliveries which made him unplayable in the successive IPL editions and even in the Kolkata Knight Riders’ victorious 2024 season.
Once, Gambhir became the head coach of the Indian Cricket Team, it was only a matter of time before Chakravarthy would be back into the scheme of the national team. Between the fag end of 2024 till the early months of 2025, Chakravarthy featured in the T20 format and collected a truckload of wickets. Gambhir felt he was ready for a crack in the 50-over format, and he definitely delivered the goods. He debuted in the format in Jan-Feb 2025 and used the Indian pitch conditions to his advantage. He even won the Player of the Series in a bilateral tournament, and this made Gambhir believe that Chakravarthy could be the X-factor in their Champions Trophy campaign.
Just when the team needed a boost in their chances to make it to the semi-final, he came in and weaved his magic, and even played his part in the grand finale.
Chakravarthy will be remembered for unsettling the opposition and stifling them with his variations. His contributions have been immense and he has played one of the many key roles in the victorious Champions Trophy campaign in Dubai!
Resilience, Belief and Practice! Chakravarthy has etched his name in the history books and will be remembered whenever India’s cricket trophy cabinet is spoken about.
Congratulations to Chakravarthy, and all Indian cricket fans are hoping he continues his rich vein of form in the IPL, bilateral tournaments the upcoming ICC marquee events and the Olympics, too!
Varun Chakravarthy is spinning a web around teams and delivering wickets whenever it matters with his sensational spin-bowling talent! All the best to him and Team India.
