UP Yoddha storm into playoffs
UP Yoddha defeated table toppers Dabang Delhi KC 50-33 to enter the playoffs of the Pro Kabaddi League Season 7 at the Shaheed Vijay Singh Pathik Sports Complex in Greater Noida on Saturday night.
It was the raiders for the team who shined the brightest as Monu Goyat notched up his first Super 10 after returning from injury, scoring 11 raid points in the match. He was well supported by the inform Shrikant Jadhav who scored nine raid points by the end of the match.
The first half began and it seemed to be the day for the return star Goyat who got his team off to a flyer with 6 raid points within the first 15 points for the team. It was Captain Nitesh Kumar who inflicted the first all out on Dabang Delhi with a tackle on Aman Kadian giving his team 10-5 lead within the first six minutes of the half. With this tackle Nitesh also achieved the milestone of 200 points in PKL. Delhi looked clueless for most of the half as U.P. kept the pressure on and entered half-time with a 22-12 lead with all of their seven players on court. In the first half, Goyat alone scored eight raid points.
The second half started in a similar fashion as Goyat opened the half with a single point raid. What followed was a treat for the home crowd as U.P. inflicted the second all out on Delhi. It was again Captain-Nitesh Kumar whose tackle did the trick for his team. U.P. now led by a 14 point margin as the score stood at 29-15 with 18 minutes remaining in the half.
Delhi saw a ray of home as a Super Raid from Neeraj Narwal reduced the gap to 31-21 with 14 minutes left in the half but U.P. was in no mood to let the lead slip. At 34-21, Shrikant Yadav got a two pointer by touch points on Sumit and Mohit, which also marked the completion of 100 touch points in season 7.
The score now stood at 36-21. It was U.P. all the way as a third allout saw Delhi being reduced to a sorry figure as U.P. led 43-26 with just more than four minutes left in the second half. Yoddha’s allround prowess was too much for Dabang Delhi as they closed the match with a 17 point win over Delhi to qualify for the playoffs. The score at the end of the second half stood at 50-33 in favour of U.P.
U.P Yoddha now stood at 63 points from 19 matches with 11 wins, six losses and two draws.
PIRATES BEAT FORTUNEGIANTS Later, three-time champions Patna Pirates defeated Gujarat Fortunegiants 3933. Pardeeep Narwal, with 17 raid points, was the hero of the match for the Pirates once again, as they came back from being 11 points down to clinch the match. Coach Manpreet Singh was in no mood to try out young players in his Gujarat Fortunegiants side despite failing to make it to the playoffs but the season six runners-up made a slow start to the game.
Ruturaj Koravi tackled Patna’s Pardeep Narwal in the first minute but the Pardeep came back to influence the match and push the Fortunegiants towards an All-Out.
But the defence-heavy Fortunegiants had other ideas as they pulled off a series of Super Tackles (two on Pardeep Narwal and one on Mohammad Esmaeil Maghsoudlou) around the 10th minute to prevent the All-Out and move to a lead.