Sivaramakrishnan first drew attention as a 12-year-old, claiming 7 wickets for 2 runs (7/2) in a Madras inter-school championship game.

At fifteen, he was the youngest member of the Under-19 India squad that toured Sri Lanka under Ravi Shastri in 1980.

On his debut against the Delhi cricket team in the quarter-final of the 1981/82 Ranji Trophy, he took 7 for 28 in the second innings, all the wickets coming in a spell of eleven overs.

Sivaramakrishnan was immediately noticed and picked for the team to tour Pakistan in 1982/83 and later to the West Indies.

Later that year, he was back in the Indian side, taking 4 for 27 against the visiting England cricket team for the India Under-25.

He was the third-youngest player to take ten wickets in a match at the age of 18 years and 333 days against England.

In the World Championship of Cricket in Australia in the same season, he finished as the top wicket-taker and also took the most catches in the tournament.

Sivaramakrishnan converted himself into a batsman and continued to play first-class cricket on and off for another ten years.

With Hugh Bromley-Davenport and B. K. Venkatesh Prasad, he shares the record for the longest'supposed' surname among Test cricketers.