Mumbai, Jan 5 (IANS) Young Bittu impressed with six tackle points on his debut as U Mumba got their home leg off to a rollicking start as they earned a commanding 40-35 win over Bengaluru Bulls in the Pro Kabaddi League Season 10 match at the DOME by NSCI here on Friday.
Buoyed by a boisterous home crowd, U Mumba went all guns blazing from the first raid and inflicted an All-Out as early as the 7th minute. Guman Singh and Amirmohammad Zafardanesh picked points at will and the U Mumba defence was rock-solid as Bittu’s tackle on Aman put U Mumba ahead 11-3.
Bengaluru Bulls were forced to play catch up thereon. Their first tackle point came only in the 11th minute and that summed up their defensive show as they struggled to contain U Mumba’s three-pronged raiding unit. Bulls’ ace raider Bharat was unable to find a rhythm and Vikash Kandola offered some hope but failed to capitalize on numerous chances to inflict the All-Out on U Mumba. The home team played with 3 men for nearly five minutes and held on to go into the break with a 19-10 lead.
U Mumba extended their lead early into the second half as Zafardanesh’s multi-point raid reduced the Bulls to 2 men. Sushil came off the bench to the Bulls’ rescue and scored 6 quickfire points and Aman claimed a Super Tackle, but it still wasn’t enough to stop U Mumba from grabbing a second All-Out. With 12 minutes left, the hosts sat pretty at 28-18. The former PKL winner brought on a couple of players from the bench for the remainder of the match as they dominated the proceedings. Bittu, who replaced Rinku in the U Mumba line-up, trapped Bharat in a fine tackle to claim a High 5.
The Bulls’ veteran defender Surjeet Singh produced a moment of magic towards the end of the game as he outwitted 3 defenders to execute the first Super Raid of the match. Incidentally, this was also the first Super Raid of Surjeet’s PKL career.
Sachin Narwal followed it up with another sublime Super Raid and U Mumba had just two men left on the mat. The Bulls went on to bag an All-Out in the final raid of the match, but it wasn’t enough to erase their deficit as U Mumba clinched their 5th win on the trot.
–IANS
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