Delhi-based coach Suresh Batra, who was assistant coach to Rajkumar Sharma when current India captain Virat Kohli began training at the West Delhi Cricket Academy, has passed away on Thursday. He was 53.According to senior journalist Vijay Lokapally, Batra collapsed on Thursday morning after his daily prayers.“ Suresh Batra (striped t-shirt), who coached @imVkohli when he was a teenager, passed away on Thursday. He had finished his daily morning puja and collapsed. He was 53,” Lokapally tweeted.
He further quoted Rajkumar Sharma, Kohli’s childhood coach, as saying, “I lost my younger brother. Knew him since 1985.”It was Sharma and Batra who helped Kohli improve his cricket, when he started training under them aged nine. Besides Kohli, several other notable Delhi cricketers including the 2018 U-19 World Cup winner Manjot Kalra, who also scored a century in the final against Australia, also trained under Batra. Meanwhile, Virat Kohli-led team India will now head to England to play the ICC World Test Championship final (WTC) followed by five-match Test series against England. Currently, the team is in Mumbai serving the mandatory quarantine period before departing to England on June 02. The women’s team too will depart playing an all-format series against England starting on June 16 and then playing three ODIs and T20 matches.
