What happened to S Badrinath? Ex-CSK star fades after early IPL success and India debut

India is a country with a population of over a billion people and among the few things that bring the entire nation together, one is cricket. Almost every child, who aspires to be a cricketer, has a dream of representing the nation. However, it's not an easy task for a cricketer to make his way into the national team as there are only 15 slots and lakhs of people waiting to grab those. 

ALSO READ | CSK pay tribute to MS Dhoni with a special song in latest Instagram post

While some players manage to make it and make it big, there are also players who get in, do well but vanish from the scene and are often left forgotten. One such player is S Badrinath, who showed initial promise but soon faded into oblivion. Fans often wonder what happened to S Badrinath, a player who was deemed to be the next big thing in Indian cricket.

What happened to S Badrinath?

S Badrinath made his India debut in the 2008 series against Sri Lanka. Incidentally, that was also Virat Kohli's debut series. S Badrinath played his maiden ODI in the second game of the series where he scored a fighting 27 to guide India to a win in a low-scoring contest. Less than two years later, he made his Test debut with a couple of big stars out injured.

ALSO READ | CSK: Where is Manpreet Gony now? CSK's IPL 2008 star forgotten after debut under MS Dhoni

In what was a memorable two-match Test series against South Africa, S Badrinath played both games and in his maiden Test, he was one of the only two batsmen who showed some character. He scored 56 against a lethal South African attack. However, the Tamil Nadu lad failed to capitalize on this performance and lost his place from the team. It also became difficult for him to break into the Indian side again mainly because the Indian team's middle order was filled with legends like Rahul Dravid, Sachin Tendulkar, Sourav Ganguly and VVS Laxman. His maiden Test series eventually turned out to be his last for India in whites.

As far as IPL is concerned, S Badrinath played for Chennai Super Kings (CSK) for 6 years (2008-13). The batsman has more than 1400 runs to his name in the IPL. He often played cameo roles for the team in the middle order, taking them to victory with his sound technique and power hitting. With more than 1400 runs in the IPL, S Badrinath showed that he wasn't a uni-dimensional player.

However, his performances started declining and subsequently he missed out on an IPL contract in 2014. It came as a shock to the Tamil Nadu batsman, who described it as a big blow to his chest. The right-hander hung his boots from all forms of cricket in August 2018. Post-retirement, Badrinath has turned into a cricket commentator, featuring often in Star Sports' Tamil broadcast or shows and has often said that he would like to spend more time with his family. He has also expressed his desire to coach a state team in first-class cricket.

In an interview with Hindustan Times recently, Badrinath claimed that while he had more memories than regrets in his cricket career, he wished that he changed his approach back then and tried to fight for the empty all-rounder's slot by focussing on his bowling, something which Kedar Jadhav does in the ODI team today. The Tamil Nadu player otherwise believes that a packed batting line up did not allow him to fulfill his potential.

ALSO READ | MS Dhoni urged CSK to bid for me in IPL 2020 auction: Piyush Chawla

What happened to S Badrinath? The former CSK player's stats

In his first-class and List A, S Badrinath scored 10,245 and 4,164 runs respectively with 38 centuries and 73 half-centuries. In IPL, he played 95 matches and scored 1,441 runs at a healthy average of 30.65 and strike rate of 118.89. S Badrinath featured for India in 7 ODIs scoring 79 runs while in Tests he represented the country in 2 games scoring 53 runs.

ALSO READ | CSK love? K Srikkanth picks MS Dhoni over Sourav Ganguly as better captain in home Tests

IMAGE COURTESY: S BADRINATH INSTAGRAM