ON a sultry Tuesday afternoon, D Deepesh walks out of the ICF Cricket Ground in ICF Colony in Madurai Panthers training kit. The lanky 18-year-old maintains a quiet demeanour when he is approached for an interview. He still had his physio session left, a few feet away, and says will finish and come.
Even as one of the team physiotherapists gets to work with Deepesh on the table, the teenager has his eyes on the two dogs within the premises. He continues his chat with the physiotherapist while trying to pet the dogs once in a while when they approach him. Shortly after, he sits down for a chat with CE.
Over the next ten minutes or so, Deepesh — who is playing his first Tamil Nadu Premier League (TNPL) season — maintains his calm attitude while trying to recall his journey as an up-and-coming cricketer ahead of his first match at the iconic MA Chidambaram Stadium on Thursday where Madurai Panthers will play iDream Tiruppur Tamizhans.
“It has been a very enjoyable journey so far. I am not thinking about playing for the first time in Chepauk because we have to win this match and move towards qualification. But at the same time, there is a little bit of excitement to play in front of the TNPL crowd at Chepauk,” he says.
Deepesh may be a typical introverted teenager off the field, and under the limelight, but give a leather ball in his hands and light up the floodlights, the young pacer will turn into a beast. It has been the story of his life since he picked up the tennis ball and ran in fast to hit the stumps. He did it with a tennis ball in the neighbourhood before graduating to season ball.
Deepesh featured in age-group cricket for districts and then for the state before doing it for India U19. In fact, the U19 World Cup winner has already made headlines over the last couple of weeks, clocking north of 145 KpH in the speedgun consistently. Ask him how he picked up fast bowling, and it all leads back to his dad and former Tamil Nadu batter Vasudevan Devendran.
It is impossible to tell the story of Deepesh without understanding the journey of his father. A hard-hitting batter in his time, Vasudevan was a part of the state team that won the inaugural Syed Mushtaq Ali Trophy (SMAT) in 2007. He was the joint leading run-scorer for TN along with Anirudha Srikkanth, smashing 285 runs in ten innings at a strike rate of 136.36. Just when it looked like his cricketing career was getting started, Vasudevan was signed by the now defunct Indian Cricket League (ICL).
“I used to play tennis ball cricket and had not much idea at the time. Someone saw me and took me to the MAC B ground and I did well in the leather ball. Then I started playing in TNCA (Tamil Nadu Cricket Association) lower divisions before getting a chance with the India Pistons. I did well for TN in SMAT and the ICL opportunity came. At that time, the Indian Premier League had not started and everyone was signing up for ICL. I also did,” Vasudevan recalls. However, a lower back injury during ICL and the success of IPL meant the road back to the state team was not smooth. He came back to TNCA league and remained with India Pistons where he is now an assistant coach.
While Vasudevan might not have understood the road ahead for him when he started playing cricket, he was there every step of the way for Deepesh. “He used to take me to watch the First Division league when I was a kid. I used to watch Dale Steyn on TV and love watching Sandeep Warrier,” recalls Deepesh on how it all started for him.
For Vasudevan, it did not take long to identify that his son has a special talent — pace. So much so that, at one point, the parents decided to opt for open schooling and focus on Deepesh’s coaching and cricket full-time when he was not getting time away from school to play cricket. “He had the pace at a young age. He had been in different camps. MRF Pace foundation, zonal camps, etc. I told him wherever he goes, not to compromise on his pace. When he was playing U14, keepers used to let the ball go down the leg at times because he was too fast. He had to work on his line and length, but never compromised on his pace,” says Vasudevan.
And soon the results started coming. First for Chengalpattu, then for TN U19 and India U19. He was the best bowler in U19 Asia Cup last year with 14 scalps in five games. He took a fifer in Brisbane during the Youth Test against Australia U19 in September 2025 before a victorious U19 World Cup which led to Head of Cricket, BCCI Centre of Excellence, VVS Laxman writing a letter to his parents appreciating Deepesh.
For him, the journey post the U19 World Cup has been about understanding his body and managing his preparations accordingly. While he sticks to training sessions in the morning and alternative days of gym sessions, Deepesh, in his off time, loves spending time with his friends and playing video games like any other teenager. Ask him about cricketing goals, Deepesh speaks much like his father. “When I was playing age-group and tennis ball, I never knew all these stages existed. Even now, I am not thinking too far ahead. We want to qualify as a team and win the TNPL with Panthers,” he says before joining his teammates at the ICF ground.
One thing seems certain. Deepesh is not going to be like any other teenager. He has the potential to do a lot of special things with the ball on the cricket field for years to come.