After Working For Amazon, V Koushik Stars For Karnataka In Vijay Hazare Trophy

There is a saying that goes ‘where there’s a will there’s a way’ and Karnataka’s latest bowling sensation V Koushik has pretty much proved it. The right-arm pacer starred for Karnataka in their thumping nine-wicket win over Chhattisgarh in the Vijay Hazare Trophy. V Koushik picked up four wickets for 46 run as he blew away Chhattisgarh’s top-order.

It was Koushik’s spell that reduced the opposition to 35 for 3 inside the powerplay as he picked up all the three top-order wickets. Chhattisgarh could never recover from those early setbacks and were all out for just 223. The target was never going to challenge Karnataka’s formidable top-order and their top-order ensured it with a dominating performance.

Openers KL Rahul and Devdutt Padikkal set the tone for the chase by scoring 88 and 92 respectively. Mayank Agarwal then slammed 47 from just 33 to take the side home. Coming to V Koushik, his journey in the game so far is nothing less than a typical Bollywood script. The pacer could have very much ended up with a desk job before his luck changed.

V Koushik  was a mechanical engineer who later worked for Amazon. He started his career as a leg-spinner and persisted with it until the age of 17. But a poor game around 2009 made him to switch to medium pace. After starring against Chhattisgarh, Koushik opened up about his career.

“I used to play cricket just for passion, I didn’t know about the league structure or club structure until I was 17. At 17, I started playing league cricket. Later when I joined engineering, I used to miss out on many games due to exams. Because of that, my returns were also not good enough to get me selected for zonals,” V Koushik was quoted as saying by ESPNCricinfo.

He revealed how things changed once he took a break and played for Karnataka U-23. He then went on to join Amazon and started playing cricket at all levels.

“After I finished engineering, I took a break of eight months and that’s when I played for U-23 Karnataka. I did well that year and from there it picked up. Later I joined Amazon, I worked for one-and-a-half year as a content developer. During that time, I used to play all kind of matches, league matches, corporate matches, whichever matches I could get, I used to play,” he added.