Jaipur Pink Panthers dished out an all-round show to outclass Gujarat Fortunegiants 31-25 in the Pro Kabaddi League at the Netaji Indoor Stadium in Kolkata on Sunday.
Bengal Warriors, meanwhile, extended their solid unbeaten run to three matches by beating Tamil Thalaivas 29-25 in a nail-biting contest.
With a slender 23-22 lead three minutes before the final whistle, Maninder Singh peaked at the perfect time with a stunning three-point super raid to seal the match for the Warriors.
Captain Surjeet Singh brilliantly supported in defence with a stunning thigh-ankle hold on Thivakaran to make scores 27-23 in Bengal’s favour with a minute to go. It was a mere formality from there on to script their second win from three matches at home.
Bengal tied against UP as they consolidated their position atop the Zone B standings with 40 points from 11 matches. With a sixth loss in nine outings, the Tamil Nadu side (16) were pushed to bottom.
Earlier, Jasvir Singh (six points) led from the front with his agile raids to script a turnaround just before the half-time for the Jaipur side and hand the Zone A leaders their second defeat on the trot.
Pawan Kumar played a perfect ally to his skipper and garnered four raid points. Credit should also be given to their star defender Somvir Shekhar who foiled Gujarat’s bid for a comeback and logged four points as Jaipur (28) jumped to third place with their fifth win from eight matches.
The Kabaddi Kid from @BengalWarriors - Jang Kun Lee becomes the 1st overseas player to score 3⃣0⃣0⃣ raid points in #VivoProKabaddi! 👏 pic.twitter.com/OffTT3cEON
— ProKabaddi (@ProKabaddi) September 3, 2017
After surging to the top with seven wins, Gujarat (43) suffered their third loss from 12 matches. Pawan Sehrawat and Sukesh Hegde handed Gujarat a 6-2 advantage midway into the first-half.
It was about building on their attack and bolstering their defence but the Jaipur captain brought a fine turnaround. Jaipur quietly made progress with Pawan snatching some fine points while their defence too began to flourish foiling Pawan’s incisive attempts to curtail the deficit to 5-7 after 12 minutes.
It was their substitute Ajit Singh who grabbed two points with a fine raid in the 17th minute to level the scores eight-all. Known for their solid defence, Gujarat looked complacent in front of Jaipur who engineered their raids and tackles superbly to breach their opponent’s defence.
Captain Jasvir then effected an all-out at the stroke of half-time to trail past Gujarat 13-9 and they went on to make steady progress to take the gamme beyond the reach of the Zone A leaders.
Jaipur began well in the second-half with their raiders and attackers combining well, extending their lead to nine points after 26 minutes. It was sheer dominance from the Abhishek Bachchan-owned side who had a 10-point advantage with five minutes to go and did not give Gujarat any room for comeback.