Former U-19 World Cup team's standby player Mohammad Sozib dies by suicide

Former Bangladesh Under-19 player Mohammad Sozib has died in Durgapur at the age of 21. Local police confirmed it was a case of suicide, reports ESPNCricinfo.

Sozib was a right-hand opening batsman and last played competitive cricket in the 2017-18 Dhaka Premier League for Shinepukur Cricket Club. He also played three Youth ODIs for Bangladesh against Sri Lanka and Afghanistan, in 2017, and was among the standby players for the 2018 Under-19 World Cup.

Khaled Mahmud, the BCB director who is also the head coach of Bangla Trac Academy in Rajshahi where Sozib started training in 2008, remembered him as a talented cricketer.

"I can't believe what I heard," Mahmud was quoted as saying by Kaler Kantho. "I am feeling extremely sad hearing the news. He was an opening batsman who bowled medium-pace, and he played for Shinepukur Cricket Club."

Tanumoy Ghosh, a first-class cricketer from Rajshahi said: "I always believed that he could play for a long time because he was so hard working in the academy. It is sad to hear what happened to him."

There's no service that provides institutional support for mental health issues to sportspersons in Bangladesh. Only BCB has provided mental health specialists from time to time in the past.