Gujarat Fortunegiants extended their unbeaten streak to seven matches after beating Puneri Paltan 35-21 on Tuesday in the Pro Kabaddi league. UP Yoddha slumped to their fourth straight loss after narrowly going down 31-32 to Bengal Warriors in Tuesday’s second match.
Here’s how both matches played out:
Gujarat Fortunegiants continue rampant run
Iran’s Fazel Atrachali was the star of the show picking nine tackle points – the most this season in a single game.
The match started with a few empty raids but Gujarat’s young sensation Sachin opened the account with a bonus. Atrachali initiated the first tackle and Pune had no raid points till the sixth minute, until captain Deepak Hooda came in to pick up a two-pointer.
The match was fairly balanced in the first 10 minutes of the first half before Gujarat unleashed the beast and kept on picking points through both attack and defence after that. They inflicted the first all-out of the match on Pune in the 14th minute as the Paltan failed to score a point from the seventh to the 18th minute.
The deadlock was broken by a Sandeep Narwal tackle but Pune were left playing catch up throughout the match. They faced a second all-out of the match that ended with their loss.
With this win, Gujarat Fortunegiants remained on top of Zone A with 41 points after 10 matches while Puneri Paltan are second with 21 points from six games.
Warriors-Yoddha thriller
Bengal’s Deepak Narwal starred with a Super 10, while Ran Singh and Surjeet Singh bagged three tackle points each in defence as they edged out the Yoddhas in a hard-fought game in Lucknow. Both teams refused to give an inch with the game tied at 3-3 after the first five minutes. But the Warriors slowly began to open a narrow lead in the dying minutes of the opening period.
At one point, the Warriors had a 13-8 lead but a three-point raid – one bonus and two touch points – by Rajesh Narwal and a sharp tackle tied things up at 13-13. Deepak then came into his own inflicting the first all-out of the night on the Yoddhas means that Warriors went in with a 19-14 lead at the break.
The Yoddhas were far more assertive in the second period scoring some quick points. But just when things were looking good, a brilliant two-point do-or-die raid by Deepak gave Warriors a three-point lead in 29th minute. The hosts managed to level the score at 25-25 with seven minutes remaining on the clock and pushed forward to make it a dramatic 29-29.
But a phenomenal tackle on Nitin Tomar gave Warriors a one-point advantage with two minutes to play and captain Surjeet Singh followed it up with a successful tackle on Rishank Devadiga before Jang Kun Lee raided successfully to complete the narrow win.
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