Aakash Chopra opens up Team India reportedly getting a new batting coach

Former Indian Test opener Aakash Chopra questioned how the news of Sitanshu Kotak being appointed as India’s batting coach has broken out. India has two assistant coaches in Ryan ten Doeschate and Abhishek Nayar but Kotak is expected to be added to the Gautam Gambhir-led coaching staff.

Chopra urged the Indian board to reveal such news themselves so that the fans get the right information and there are no speculations or rumors.

India recently suffered a 1-3 series against Australia in the Border-Gavaskar trophy after the batters could not deliver consistently. The Indian batting line-up could only breach the 200-run mark on three occasions in nine innings on the Australian tour.

“The biggest news is that Sitanshu Kotak has become India’s batting coach. He has been added to the coaching staff. The BCCI might announce it officially after some time. How does all this news come out? Why doesn’t the BCCI announce it themselves? If you start telling proactively, these source-based news might end,” Aakash Chopra said on his YouTube Channel.

Chopra noted that Kotak was a prolific run-getter in the domestic circuit. Kotak scored 8061 runs in 130 first-class matches whereas he amassed 3083 runs in 89 List-A games, averaging more than 40 in both formats.

“Sitanshu Kotak has been associated with the coaching setup for a long time. He has played against me as well and he used to score a lot of runs as well. He used to stop when someone moved close to the sight screen or in the dressing room. He had a unique playing style as well. He was a run-machine. He used to irritate the opposing team a lot with his idiosyncrasies,” he observed.

Meanwhile, there are reports suggesting that there will be an India A tour to England before the five-match Test series. Chopra highlighted it would be interesting to note which players would play in that series.

“There was another news. When India will go to England, there will be a few India A matches before that. Their T20 tournament might be on at that time. So you might not get very high-quality players, but as per the report, the BCCI is confident that high-quality players will be available,” he said in the same video.

“However, I am extremely eager to see whether India’s main players will play those matches because we refused in Australia. They said they wouldn’t play friendly matches. There were two matches and you didn’t play a single one. They played an intra-squad match and said that’s good enough. Will we play, and I hope we do. We don’t know the quality of it but you should play,” the former India opener added.

India will take on England in the opening Test at Leeds, Headingley from June 20 onwards.