Varun Chakravarthy’s Surprising Acting Debut Before Cricket!:

Long before Varun Chakravarthy emerged as a mystery spin phenomenon and was instrumental in guiding India to victory in the ICC Champions Trophy, his life was far from conventional. It had as many twists and turns as a Bollywood film. Varun did not always imagine himself as a cricketer, in fact, he had a completely different career goal.

Varun Chakravarthy in Jeeva Tamil film

His foray into acting came in 2014 when he starred in the Tamil sports biography film Jeeva where he played the role of a cricketer who struggles to achieve his dreams.

As destiny would have it, he was simultaneously featuring on a reality cooking show Cooku with Comali where he swapped his cricket paraphernalia for frying pans. However, while many may have seen him transit into acting and cooking, Varun's passion still lies in cricket which he had set aside for what he thought was a more sensible career plan.

Armed with an Architecture degree from SRM University, Varun worked as an architect where he designed buildings during the day, and dreamt of smashing stumps at night.

At 25, Varun made a controversial decision that many did not agree with. He quit his career as an architect and chose to pursue his goal of cricket full time.

He became a member of a club where he played as a wicketkeeper-batter and a seam bowler. He seemed to be progressing nicely, but an injury to his knee made him alter his game. That is when he figured out he was proficient in mystery spin bowling. With an education in architecture, Varun began to “design” the unplayable deliveries. His life-changing moment came in the season of 2017-18 where he achieved 31 wickets in only seven games. He turned out to be Madurai’s secret weapon in the Tamil Nadu Premier League (TNPL) and earned the noticed of IPL talent scouts. He was later bought by Kings XI Punjab for 8.4 crore rupees. Due to constant injuries, him making his premiere in the IPL was delayed until 2019 when the Kolkata knight Riders (KKR) decided to take a gamble on him. Varun is known as KKR’s spin wizard after instantly becoming their best performer with 17 wickets which included a five-wicket haul. Varun had a troublesome international journey as well. After several creatine delays, he debuted for India in T20s in 2021 and went on to be the second oldest Indian to debut in ODI. Varun was geared up to increase his profile in the ICC champions trophy final of 2025.

In the championship match with New Zealand, he contributed significantly to India's win by taking two vital wickets. He did well in the rest of the tournament as well, ending up with the second most wickets. Varun was not just an actor or an architect or a chef, he had truly become one of India's finest mystery spinners.