Live Score
Cricket Teams
Cricket Players
'As a ball boy, he kept watching Suresh Raina's batting; wasn't able to sleep that night': MI star's childhood coach
IPL 2022: Mumbai Indians are currently winless from its first eight games, the longest losing streak to start an IPL season. But the Indian has shone with the willow.
Record five-time title winners Mumbai Indians are witnessing their worst run in IPL history having lost their first eight games including the most recent one against Lucknow Super Giants on Sunday. Their performance graph has dipped to a great extent with the bowling looking like a run-of-the-mill unit. The bowlers haven't been able to make an impact, repeated failures of their batters has been a bigger concern for Rohit Sharma's men. (Follow IPL 2022 Coverage)
Skipper Rohit Sharma hasn't been his usual self while opener Ishan Kishan's performances have slumped after the fifties in the first two matches. But young Tilak Varma has been among the bright spots for Mumbai. The 19-year-old from Hyderabad has had his fair share of struggles leading up to the lucrative T20 tournament. Like many other players, Varma idolised Indian stars and he was awestruck by seeing Suresh Raina bat in an IPL game in 2014. Varma served as a ball boy during that time.
Varma's childhood coach Salam Bayash revealed Varma wanted to follow in the footsteps of Raina. "In 2014, he got an opportunity to serve as a ball boy in an IPL match. During the match, he kept watching Suresh Raina's batting. On returning home, he told me that he was inspired by Suresh Raina and wanted to practice hard, to become like him. Later that night, I spoke to Tilak's parents and they told me that he wasn't able to sleep that night and instead, kept practicing the basics," said Bayash in a video shared by Mumbai Indians.
Varma, who fetched a ₹1.70 crore paycheque in the February auction, revealed he looked up to Raina while growing up, further adding that his dream was to share the dressing room with the likes of Rohit Sharma and Sachin Tendulkar.
"Since childhood, I have been watching Suresh Raina bhai and my dream was to play with Rohit Sharma. I wanted to interact with the likes of Sachin sir," said Varma in the video.
Mumbai are winless from its first eight games, the longest losing streak to start an IPL season. But Varma has been among the top run-scorers of the season, gathering 272 runs at an average of 45.33 so far.
