How Rachin Ravindra's pursuit of excellence led to century at his father's former home

Bengaluru: Holding a glass of lemonade at one of the VIP stands of the M Chinnaswamy Stadium, Ravindra Krishnamurthy is a picture of equanimity. His son, Rachin Ravindra, has just scored a Test century in the city of his birth but you find little excitement in him.

“It’s a Test match, anyone can get a hundred,” he says matter of factly. “Devon (Conway) could have got one yesterday, but it was meant to be him (Rachin).”

Rachin made his Test debut against India in Kanpur and saved that match for New Zealand with a 91-ball 18 not out. On Friday, the left-hander, who was batting on 22 overnight, went on to compile a delightful century which was an abject lesson in the art of innings-building. While his first 50 came off 88 balls, he needed a mere 34 balls to bring up his next as he, along with Tim Southee, took New Zealand from a comfortable position to a commanding one.

While Ravindra effortlessly concealed his emotions, his observation on the preparation part was instructive. Having coached Rachin through his formative years, he knows nothing comes without hard work and disclosed the secret behind Rachin’s phenomenal success in the sub-continent. While his third career Test ton was a further affirmation of his mastery of these conditions, he had announced his credentials as a future great with three hundreds during the 2023 World Cup.

While the 24-year-old was comfortable against Indian pacers, his domination of spinners was impressive. He drove with authority, swept with conviction and was assured in his feet movement as the home spinners found him a hard nut to crack. Rarely have the likes of R Ashwin, Ravindra Jadeja and Kuldeep Yadav been put through such a tough test. But Rachin was merely enjoying the fruits of his labour. At least, his father has no doubt that the week-long training at the Chennai Super Kings’ Academy has been rewarding.         

“Rachin trained at the CSK Academy in Chennai for about a week (ahead of New Zealand’s swing of the sub-continent, starting with the washed-out match against Afghanistan in Noida),” Ravindra tells DH.

“In 40 degree celsius and in that humidity, he practiced on a gravel kind of a surface. The ball was jumping and turning, dust was coming off, you were drenched in sweat... I mean nothing can get worse than that. This century, I think, is because of that preparation. If he had come here thinking, ‘I have three days to practice before the first Test’, he would have got only a day’s practice, and that too indoors because of rain. So, it was a great move by him to train at the CSK academy.”

Ravindra Krishnamurthy

Kasi Viswanathan, the CSK CEO, further elaborated on Rachin’s stint at CSK Academy. “He came with Ben Sears (who is injured now). He trained under CSK academy coach Sriram Krishnamurthy for a week at our high-performance centre. He wanted to practice on different types of pitches, turning tracks. And obviously that is helping him,” he noted.

Not just here, his 92 against Sri Lanka in Galle in the first Test on a square-turner, was another instance of his comfort against the turning ball.     

This, however, wasn’t the first instance of Rachin putting himself through such rigour. Ahead of the 2023 World Cup, he visited various cities across India to get a sense of the conditions in order to give himself the best chance to succeed.   

“Not just now, before the (2023 50-over) World Cup also I took him to different places across India where the weather patterns are totally different but mostly hot and humid. I wanted him to get used to those conditions because coming straight from New Zealand, which is nice and cold, it becomes very difficult to acclimatise to the conditions here,” points out Ravindra.

Did that pay off? The proof is in the pudding. The southpaw finished as New Zealand’s top run-getter with 578 runs and was fourth overall among top run-getters.