The three-time champions won their second match of the Vivo Pro Kabaddi League Season 8 held on Tuesday, 28th December. After facing defeat in the last match against UP Yoddha, the team went on to play the game with motivation against Puneri Paltans in Bangalore. It was Sachin’s superb performance as he scored a Super 10, supported by the team’s strong defensive trio of Sunil with 4 points and Mohammadreza Chiyaneh & Sajin C with 3 points. Talking about the PKL team of Puneri Paltan, the lack of a quality raider remained to be a cause of concern, even though the youngsters managed to perform well. The match made Puneri Paltan lose two out of three games so far. However, Patna Pirates won the game with a 12-point lead with final scores of 38-26.
Let us explore deeper insights into the match. The game between Patna Pirates and Puneri Paltans started off fast with both the teams competing with each other on every level. The teams were separated by a difference of just one point on the scoreboard. However, Paltans’ Aslam Inamdar picked up a two-point raid, and the team’s defense made the lead with 8-6 points. The Puneri Paltan took this opportunity and initiative to attain a lead with five points. However, the team was quickly held down by four unanswered by the Patna Pirates that minimized their lead to just one. Right after this, the momentum of Puneri Paltans was disturbed after a déjà vu moment that is remembered by all PKL fans. Pirates’ Monu Goyat mistakenly stepped into the lobby area before tagging a defender of Puneri Paltans. But, clueless about this, three defenders from the Puneri Paltans followed Monu to the lobby trying to pin him down. And, this led to all the four players of Paltans out. As their team was left with just two players on the mat after Monu Goyat’s raid, it scored the final point of the first half bringing the score level at 14-14.
Moving ahead in the game, Patna Pirates took as little as 50 seconds to let the remaining two players of the Puneri Paltans out the mat. And this finally led to inflicting the first All Out of the game. Not just this but Pirates also took the lead in the game with four points. Further leveling up their team’s game, Sachin and the defense enhanced their lead to seven. However, a super tackle from the defense of Puneri Paltan and some good raiding moves made Paltan minimize their deficit down to just three. With Puneri Paltan cutting the lead of the Pirates, Sachin and the defense stepped up to come back in the game. They added four unanswered points to their team’s score, not only regaining their seven-point lead but also leaving the Paltans with just one player on the mat.
The game became matchlessly enthralling as Mohammadreza Chiyaneh made his strong ankle hold move to inflict an all-out with his team taking a 10-point lead. The game didn’t end here as Prashanth Kumar Rai and the team’s defense added four more points to the total of Patna Pirates. However, Puneri Paltan further made its way to outscore their competitor with two points in the final two minutes but it turned out to be both less and late for them.
The game finally ended with Patna Pirates winning their second match of this season!