Patna Pirates is undoubtedly on fire as it has successfully won its fifth match of the season while ending up with a tie in one of the seven total matches. The team has excellently maintained its confidence and hence, played a worth-watching match against Gujarat Giants, held on 8th January.
The match was a thrill to watch as both the teams were pacing up against each other throughout the game. However, Patna Pirates, with a lead of one point, won the match against Gujarat Giants with 27-26. Not just the team played a great match but also climbed to second position on the points table by winning its seventh match of the series. By this, the Pirates are just two behind the score table leaders Dabang Delhi K.C.
The Pirates were anyway maintaining their supremacy over the game from the beginning. Earlier the team was on lead with 5-2 as the captain, Prashanth Kumar Rai, and the defense both separately took a couple of points and Sachin took one. The duo of Gujarat Giants, Sunil Kumar & Parvesh Bhainswal attempted to lead the game by cutting the deficit to one point with Monu Goyat’s super tackle. However, the latter team responded by taking three unanswered points, leaving Gujarat with a single man on the mat.
The game continued as Mahendra Rajput joined & revived a player with a touch-point. The effort went in vain as Prashanth instantly reduced the Gujarat Giants to one by taking a touch-point of his own. This was when their team’s all-rounder Hadi Oshtorak collected a bonus and a touch-point, reviving a player. Not just this but he also super-tackled Prashant Kumar Rai, adding two more points to his team’s total. With this, the Giants gained a lead of one point.
The game moved ahead by the Giants’ Rakesh taking a point to get a lead of two points. However, Patna Pirates caught a grip of their game and leveled the scores by taking two unanswered points. Further, Sachin fled out of a Back Hold attempt by Oshtorak and reduced the team of Gujarat Giants with only one player on the mat. This was when Pirates inflicted the game’s first All-Out. Finally, both the teams went to a half-time break with Patna Pirates leading by two points.
The second half began with the Giants gearing up all motivated to level the game. The team’s Ankit and Rakesh Narwal go together to add a tackle point to their total after a 3-1 lead run. At this moment, Patna Pirates were reduced to just three players left on the mat. However, Sajin from Patna Pirates took the situation’s advantage and super-tackled Rajput and Rakesh instantly after their point lead, helping his team regain their two-point lead. Captain Prashanth and Shubham Shinde further extended their team’s lead to four. Gujarat Giants replied to this by cutting the Pirates’ lead to two. With less than five minutes left, Captain Prashanth escaped an ankle hold while tagging another defender on his way to the midline. And, this move of Rai pushed Patna’s lead up by four points.
Rajput and Rakesh further added two points to the Gujarat Giants total with 30 seconds left for the game to end. Pirates’ captain went in for the last raid and attempted to pick a bonus point for the game’s last few seconds. Although Rai failed to get a bonus point, he made sure that his team won the game!