Bengal Warriors, strengthened in attack by the inclusion of army man Nitin Tomar, gave an impressive display with a 25-17 win over Telugu Titans in the concluding tie of the first leg of the Pro Kabaddi here yesterday
Vishakhapatnam: Bengal Warriors, strengthened in attack by the inclusion of army man Nitin Tomar, gave an impressive display with a 25-17 win over Telugu Titans in the concluding tie of the first leg of the Pro Kabaddi here yesterday.
The Kolkata-based outfit hadn't performed well last season and the home team was expected to put it across by riding on the crowd support.
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But Nitin dashed their hopes as he found an able ally in Mahesh Goud in attack. The duo turned the tide after the break when the two teams were tied 9-9. The match took a decisive turn after the defending pair of corner men, Captain Nilesh Shinde and Girish Ernak struck a purple patch.
For the home team nothing went right in all the departments. Rahul got only two points for a tally of four with two tackles in the match. Sukesh Hegde was also nowhere near his usual self, scoring just a solitary point in a do-or -die raid.
Girish who had 5 tackle points, teamed up so well with Nilesh (4 tackles) that within a space of two minutes the fate of the match was decided. From a slender 15-14 advantage in the 31st minute they went up 20-15.
In the process they scored an all-out, the only one of the match in the 33rd minute of play. Nitin got rid of the dangerous Meraj Sheykh and Prashant Kumar Rai to register the all-out.
Girish then came up with two good frontal blocks and a double thigh hold to get rid of the Iranian Meraj and the Telugu Titans' star raider Rahul Chaudhari to make it 22-15 with the last five minutes call given by the referee.
The losers had to come with a superlative effort but that wasn¿t to be. The Bengal Warriors had the last laugh when a bonus awarded to Rohit Baliyan who had a good match was negated by the TV umpire.
The losers in the bargain lost an opportunity to grab one point for not losing the tie by less than a seven-point margin.
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