Rachin Ravindra

Some Lesser Known Facts About Rachin Ravindra

• Rachin Ravindra is a New Zealander cricketer. He plays as a batting all-rounder for the New Zealand national cricket team. He rose to fame after scoring his maiden ODI century in the opening match of the 2023 Cricket World Cup at the Narendra Modi Stadium in Ahmedabad, Gujarat.

• His family has its roots in Bengaluru, Karnataka, India.

• Rachin’s parents shifted from India to Wellington in the early 1990s. While his father was in India, he used to play club-level cricket in his hometown Bangalore.

• Rachin grew up watching his father play cricket and developed an interest in the sport. He began playing cricket at a very young age. As a child, he also loved watching cricket on television.

  

• Rachin used to practise cricket in his backyard with his father.

• While in school, he was a part of the school cricket team. When he was studying in class 11, Rachin represented his school in a cricket tournament, where he scored 208 runs and also took six wickets. He was named the player of the tournament.

  

• In 2016, Rachin was included in New Zealand’s Under-19 squad for the U-19 World Cup.

• He was a part of New Zealand’s Under-19 team during the 2018 Under-19 Cricket World Cup. After the World Cup concluded, Rachin was named as the rising star of the squad by the International Cricket Council (ICC).

• Rachin has played through the age ranks for New Zealand.

• Rachin plays for Wellington at the top order in domestic matches.

• On 30 October 2018, he played his debut first-class match for New Zealand A against Pakistan A at ICCA Dubai.

• Rachin Ravindra played his first List A match for New Zealand A against Pakistan A on 21 October 2018 at Tolerance Oval.

• During the 2018–19 season of the Tom Ford Trophy, Rachin received a contract from Wellington.

• On 27 January 2019, he played his first T20 match for Wellington against Otago at Dunedin.

• He scored in maiden List A century during a match for Wellington against Auckland in the 2019–20 Ford Trophy on 25 November 2019.

• Rachin scored his maiden First-class cricket century in March 2020 during a match in the 2019–20 season of the Plunket Shield.

• He received a contract for the 2020–21 domestic cricket season from Wellington in June 2020.

•  In November 2020, he was a part of the New Zealand A team that competed against West Indies during their tour in India. Rachin played a few practice matches for New Zealand and scored 112 runs in his first practice match.

• He was a part of New Zealand’s Test squad for their series against England in April 2021. He was also a part of New Zealand’s squad for the final of the 2019–21 ICC World Test Championship.

  

• He was a part of the New Zealand cricket team that played the final of the 2019–21 ICC World Test Championship.

• In August 2021, he was a part of New Zealand’s T20 international cricket team that toured Bangladesh.

• Thereafter, he was included in New Zealand’s one-day international squad for their tour in Pakistan. He played his first one-day international match for New Zealand against Sri Lanka in Aukland.

  

• On 1 September 2021, he played his debut T20 international match for New Zealand against Bangladesh at Mirpur.

• In June 2022, he was signed by the Durham County Cricket Club to play for them in the County Championship in England.

• He scored his maiden double-century in a first-class match by making 217 runs in his debut match for Durham against Worcestershire.

• He has also represented the Wellington Under 17, Wellington Under 19, and Wellington Firebirds teams at the domestic level.

• Rachin was named in New Zealand’s Test squad for their Test series against India in November 2022.

• In 2023, he was included in New Zealand’s squad for the Cricket World Cup. In the opening match of the World Cup, Rachin scored his maiden century against England at the Narendra Modi Stadium in Ahmedabad, Gujarat. Scoring 123 (not out) runs off 96 balls, featuring 5 sixes and 11 fours, Rachin became the fourth New Zealander cricketer to score a century in an ODI World Cup debut. During the match, he, along with Devon Conway, established a partnership of 273 runs off 211 balls, the fourth-highest partnership in World Cup history.

  

• In his spare time, Rachin loves to travel and do adventure sports.

  

• In childhood, he admired the Indian cricketer Sachin Tendulkar. In an interview, while talking about Sachin, Rachin said,
  

  Obviously, I idolised Sachin Tendulkar. I think a lot of people did. I think the way he batted and his technique was beautiful to watch. I guess being a lefty, there’s guys you look at: I love Lara, I love Sangakkara, just the usual gun left-handers; but Tendulkar was definitely the idol.”

• In an interview, Rachin revealed that he was a big fan of the American basketball player Kobe Bryant, and he chose jersey number 8 as a tribute to Kobe. He said,
  

  My jersey number is eight and the significance around it is I’m a big basketball fan and that was Kobe Bryant’s first number when he first entered the NBA.”

• Apparently, Rachin’s name is a combination of the first names of Rahul Dravid and Sachin Tendulkar. Rachin’s father kept his name after Rahul and Sachin as he was a huge fan of them. However, later, his father shared in an interview that his name was not kept by combining the names of Rahul and Sachin instead, it was suggested by his mother as she liked the name. They discovered it later that his name was a combination of Rahul and Sachin. ^[4]Business Today

• He is very particular about his fitness and follows a strict workout regimen.

• Rachin often consumes alcohol at parties and events.

  

• Initially, Rachin learned cricket from his father. Later, he received training from the cricket coaches Ivan Tissera, Mark Borthwick, Paul Wiseman, Bob Carter, Sriram Krishnamurthy, Glenn Pocknell, and Bruce Edgar.

• In an interview, Rachin shared that every year, his father used to take a few age-group boys to India to gain experience at Indian cricket grounds. He further revealed that he had visited Anantapur (RDT), Chennai, Bangalore, Hyderabad, and Mysore in India.

• In an interview, Rachin’s father revealed that when Rachin was 1 year old, he had a small hole in his heart due to which his parents did not allow him to play for long hours. By the time, he turned 4, the hole closed on its own and he became perfectly normal.

• On 19 December 2023, Rachin was picked by Chennai Super Kings for a fee of Rs. 1.80 crore against the base price of Rs. 50 lakh in the 2024 IPL auction, held at the Coca-Cola Arena in Dubai.