Pro Kabaddi: U Mumba notch hat-trick of wins, Telugu Titans thump Puneri Paltan

Mumbai: Trailing in the first half by a solitary point, Telugu Titans came up with a strong second half showing to outclass Puneri Paltan 45-24 to notch their second win on the trot in the Star Sports Pro Kabaddi League. Hosts of the first leg, U Mumba, continued their strong start to the second season with three wins out of three as they overcame a spirited Patna side 25-20 in the day’s second match. [caption id=“attachment_2353944” align=“alignleft” width=“380”]  Meraj Sheykh (Telugu Titans) tackled by Mahipal Narwal (Puneri Paltan). Source: Pro Kabaddi[/caption] The Titans were down 13-14 at the halfway stage before skipper Rahul Chadhari brought off a splendid revival with his super raids as well as some smart tackles to help them turn the tables on their rivals at the NSCI Stadium here. Titans had beaten Dabang Delhi 36-27 in their opening clash while this was Pune’s first game of the league. Chaudhari logged 12 raid points and 2 tackle points in the game. He turned in two spectacular raids to gain two touch points as well as make the rival side all out on two occasions. He was well supported in offence by Deepak Hudda who garnered six raid points plus one tackle point. The Titans’ defence was so good in the first half that they kept rival captain and star raider Wazir Singh without a point in the opening half before he came into his own in the second half to get 7 raid points. Yogesh Hudda got 6 raid points and Mahipal Narwal did his bit in defense with three tackle points for the losers. For the winners, Rajguru Subramanian produced two brilliant thigh tackles on way to log 3 points while Sandeep secured 5 tackle points. Overall, the Titans were ahead by 24-14 in attack, 14-7 in defense and they also got Pune all out twice while avoiding this ignominy in the match. Pune initially led 7-5 before the Titans caught up at 9. Pune surged ahead to 11-9 and then 14-11 with three minutes left in the first half with Hudda in form but his substitution after a failed do-or-die raid tilted the game in Titans’ favour. Titans went into the lead immediately after the start of the second half and never looked behind before running out convincing victors. Later, hosts and last year’s runners-up U Mumba notched up their third win on the trot by outsmarting Patna Pirates 25-20. The Mumbai outfit led 17-10 at half-time. Once again it was their superior raiding from captain Anup Kumar (7 points including 6 in raids), Shabeer Bapu (5)and Rishank Devadiga (4) that did the trick for U Mumba. In defense, Mohit Chillar and Jeeva Kumar picked up a two points each. Though the Pirates made a strong effort towards the end, they could not get past their Mumbai rivals and suffered a defeat in their lung opener. Skipper Rakesh Kumar flopped without getting a point and it was left to Sandeep Narwal to produce an all round effort (8 points including 6 in raids) to keep them in the hunt. Ravi Dalal did his bit by picking up four points in attack. PTI