Follow UsYou still remember your worst mistake, don’t you?
In everyone’s life, one moment always returns to haunt you.
November 1, 2022, is that day in Luvnith Sisodia’s life. It was a day that could have made his career, but a dropped catch of Shubman Gill turned into a moment that would haunt the youngster.
When Sisodia dropped Gill, he was still batting on 34, and then he went on to end with a 55-ball 126, as Karnataka lost the game by just nine runs – his biggest regret in cricketing life.
“I dropped Shubman Gill’s catch. It was a disappointing time; I overran and misjudged the catch. I was left out of the side after that clash, and it was a hard time, not because I was dropped, but because I cost the team an important match. I always feel that I owe a trophy to Karnataka, and I’m working for that to come true,” an emotional Sisodia opened up about that day in a Cricket.com exclusive.
What followed wasn’t an easy passage of play in Sisodia’s life, as that one event combined with the brutal trolling led him to think, ‘Am I good enough?’
“Won’t say that I was mentally strong, oh, this and that. I’m going to be very honest, I was very fragile, I was thinking, ‘Oh shit, now what?’. There were a lot of negative thoughts in my mind. But eventually you pull things up, and say, ‘You got to focus on the controllables.’”
Right from as a kid, Sisodia knew nothing but cricket, as he constantly proved everyone wrong at various junctures of his life. One such was in 2022, when he smashed a 20-ball 48 in an Under-25 Trophy clash against Mumbai in a run chase of 345, which made him a permanent fixture for the 2022/23 SMAT.
“I see it this way: cricket has always been my passion. There’s nothing else I wanted to do in my life, so that fire always burns brightly inside me. As a kid, you’d want to play for the country, so that fire is what still keeps me going.
“Then all the other smaller things, like the domestic league, the IPL, come along the way. It is important to understand that the fire needs to be in the right place.”
Especially after that dreadful incident, the burning fire inside Sisodia showed up when KSCA Secretary XI took on Mumbai in the annual invitational tournament, Dr Thimmappiah in 2024. A 24-year-old Sisodia showed Ranji champions Mumbai their place, smashing 187 off 262 balls, which brought him back into the mix for the Ranji Trophy 2024/25.
“187 is very special too because it was at home, and came against a strong Mumbai bowling attack that had names such as Shardul, Tushar, Royston, and more. We were chasing about 480, and my knock was very crucial for the team, as it was in a winning cause. It was a surreal feeling, and that knock was why I got into the Ranji Trophy squad,” he revealed.
Time at RCB
While that 187 came in 2024, it was his earlier knock—48 off 20 against Mumbai—that led to Sisodia’s maiden IPL call-up with his home franchise, Royal Challengers Bengaluru (RCB).
“48 off 20 – came in the quarterfinal against Mumbai, where we were chasing 330. My knock helped the team to get off to a good start. Some scouts were watching that, and they were impressed; that’s how I ended up at RCB.”
Everyone knows Sisodia’s time at RCB was short-lived due to a freakish injury, ruling him out of the competition. At 22, he had a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to share a dressing room with Virat Kohli and Glenn Maxwell.
During that camp, the Bengaluru-born boy had a fruitful 15-minute chat with the Australian all-rounder, learning the nuances of reverse sweep.
“I spoke to [Glenn] Maxwell for about 15 minutes and asked him how a reverse sweep should be played. He helped me out, teaching me the proper technique of playing a reverse sweep, spending 10-15 minutes, helping me play it the right way,” he recalled.
As memorable as the Maxwell conversation was, Sisodia was beaming with joy when he recollected the 35-minute chat with RCB’s stalwart, Kohli. Growing up playing cricket, the Bengalurean always considered Kohli as one to look up to, and when he got a chance to spend some time with him, he was frozen.
“Of course, my time with Virat Kohli was unforgettable; he’s a legend. I got to talk with him for almost 35 minutes, and I was shocked. It was a fan-boy moment for me, and to be part of your home IPL team was an unforgettable experience at RCB.
“During those 35 minutes, I asked him about the game, about how to handle certain things in personal life. I asked him how he resets himself and forgets the past, whether it went well or not,” he added.
While Sisodia wants the details of the conversations to be private, he revealed that those 35 minutes shaped his life differently, personally and professionally.
Fresh IPL start with Kolkata Knight Riders
Remember the first part of the story where Sisodia recollected his harrowing memory?
Guess the venue where that happened? Eden Gardens, Kolkata Knight Riders’ home, aka Sisodia’s new IPL franchise. It was quite a bittersweet moment for the left-hander to return to the same place that almost took everything away from him.
“I remember, Eden Gardens was where everything went wrong for me, and it was the same ground where I got to restart my IPL career. The experience in KKR’s camp was extraordinary; no one felt they were greater than the team. Everyone was treated the same way, be it a big star or a new player. It was a family-like feeling to be in that dressing room,” Sisodia said.
From a career standpoint, those 60 days were among the best of his career, as he worked closely with Abhishek Nayar, one of India’s best technical coaches. Nayar has worked closely with several key figures in Indian cricket, including Rohit Sharma and Dinesh Karthik.
Eyeing this as an opportunity, the left-hander quickly texted the Mumbaikar to find a fix for his cricketing problem.
“I heard a lot about Abhishek [Nayar] sir before the camp, and I was excited to work with him. He’s someone who knows what he’s really doing and understands the players’ perspective excellently.
“I texted Abhishek sir, saying, ‘This is an area of concern for me, I want to work on this.’ I got an instant reply within minutes. He asked for a few videos of my batting, so he can notice those things and help me work on them.
“He was always there at 7 PM for all the practice sessions, and we were lucky to have him.
The sessions were valuable and knowledgeable. Every practice session, I learnt something new, and I improved a lot at the end of the tournament. I understood how a certain scenario is supposed to be played and how certain conditions demand certain shots.”
As Sisodia points out, it wasn’t just generic training sessions; they were much more detailed, like target scenarios where the batter has to complete a set objective: 16 runs off six balls. Not only did he work on the youngster’s technical issues, but he also sharpened him up for actual match situations.
“Just because it is T20 cricket, you don’t go blindly after every ball. Every pitch, every condition has a different way of batting, and that’s what I learnt with Abhishek sir. During every practice session, he set me target scenarios, like 16 off 6, and wanted to see how I was planning to chase it down. He was preparing me for match situations at the training session.”
Like his time with RCB, there was no dearth of stardom in the KKR camp too. One such star interaction was with Andre Russell, who narrowly beat him in the Super Sixes competition.
“I remember one situation where I interacted with Andre Russell about his six-hitting skills; it was a funny story. It was, I think, during the Super Sixes competition, where I was there alongside Russell. He just beat me by two metres in that competition, and I told him, ‘Come on man, I deserve it’, and he replied, ‘Nah man, this is mine’.”
Influence of Maharaja T20, and a renewed focus on future
If you have to trace Luvnith Sisodia’s growth, you won’t be able to do it without the Maharaja T20 Trophy, a competition that shaped his life. Since 2019, the left-hander has honed all of his T20 skills in Karnataka’s best franchise competition, smashing 1191 runs, averaging 32.19 with a stellar strike rate of 155.1.
“It [Maharaja T20] is a huge tournament for Karnataka cricketers, whether you are big or small. Everyone are watching this tournament, including IPL scouts. You are playing some premium bowlers, some who have also played for the country, so that way there is the challenge. It is a stepping stone for all of us, to the SMAT team or at the IPL level.”
Over the last few years, Sisodia has actively worked on sharpening his batting, and who better than India’s power-hitting coach, RX Muralidhar, to help him. It has shown in his game, as the southpaw upgraded his strike rate to 197.8, a sharp rise from his Maharaja T20 strike rate of 149.3.
“I have worked a lot on my batting with RX Murali sir; he’s always been there for me. It could even be some smaller aspects like singles and doubles, but I have also worked on those. I now better understand angles and where I can maximize the run-scoring. You can see it this year; I got a lot of runs in angles and areas that I normally don’t score.
“The tournament this year has been great for me, but winning the trophy is the most important thing. I just focus on how I can win the trophy for the team [Gulbarga Mystics].”
Did the Gill drop have a direct bearing on Sisodia’s wicketkeeping abilities? The youngster believes it led to further introspection and minor corrections over his game. Apart from working with some greats in Karnataka cricket, he also had a quick chat with MS Dhoni, who asked him to ‘keep things simple’.
“Actually, I’ve always been a good wicketkeeper, but there were a couple of important drops that let me down. So, I sat myself down and worked hard on my keeping drills. I worked on that aspect with Siruguppi sir, Deepak Chougle, and Rajshekar Shanbal sir. They are all greats of the game, and they know wicketkeeping quite well.
“I was not in a mindset to prove people wrong; I wanted to show myself that I belonged at that level. I just wanted to clear the doubts in my mind. When I was at RCB, I didn’t get the chance to meet Mahi [MS Dhoni] bhai. But this year, I spoke to him about wicketkeeping. He gave me a set of drills, and I followed them to the T.
“Oh, those drills are not even basic; they are very simple, but you know, when someone like Mahi bhai says, you follow them blindly. That worked for me.”
Since he was dropped in 2022, Sisodia had plenty of hardships, but over the last year, things have improved drastically as the wicketkeeper has earned himself a recall into the Karnataka setup – small but significant steps.
“A lot of progress, of course. I was a part of the Ranji Trophy team last year. Unfortunately, again, I got injured. So all these are good, small positives where you are pushing yourself. I’ve always craved to play red-ball cricket; that’s the epitome of cricket. It is quite tough to be part of Karnataka’s setup because of the quality of players. So, it was quite positive that I could break through.”
One thing’s clear: a 35-minute chat with Kohli, a brief conversation with Maxwell, training under RX Murali, and following MS Dhoni’s wicketkeeping drills have helped the youngster upgrade to Luvnith Sisodia 2.0.