Pardeep, Deepak catapult Patna Pirates over U.P. Yoddha

Patna Pirates put in yet another spirited performance and came back from an early deficit to defeat U.P. Yoddha 43-37 at the Motilal Nehru School of Sports, Rai in Sonepat on Sunday.

U.P. Yoddha raced off to an early lead after some good work from Shrikant Jadhav and captain Rishank Devadiga. After raiding successfully, Devadiga then showed off his defensive skills as well as he tackled Dubki King Pardeep Narwal to push U.P. Yoddha’s lead to five points with the score at 6-1. With just two men on the mat for Patna Pirates, it seemed like U.P. Yoddha would inflict an early All Out on them but Vijay managed to get a hold of Devadiga’s ankle to get a Super Tackle on him and reduce the deficit to just two.

Check out the photos from the match here.

Vijay’s tackle completely switched the momentum in Patna Pirates’ favour as they scored five out of the next six points in the match to take an 8-7 lead. With Pardeep Narwal on the bench, Patna Pirates substituted Manjeet in and that decision paid off instantly as he got both the U.P. Yoddha Corners in the same raid. Jaideep and Vijay tackled Devadiga and Jadhav on successive raids, split by Pardeep Narwal getting a touch point on Amit leaving only Sagar Krishna on the mat for U.P. Yoddha, who was powerless in stopping Pardeep Narwal from inflicting an All Out. With the first half winding down, Patna Pirates led 19-14 when Jadhav came in for the last raid of the half and delivered the match’s first Super Raid to reduce the deficit to just two at halftime.

In the second half, Deepak Narwal scored four points off his opening two raids, including a Super Raid, where he got Nitesh Kumar and Devadiga. With the team facing a six-point deficit, Jadhav produced the moment of the match, getting all four Patna Pirates players and inflicting an All Out to get a six-point raid, levelling the score at 24-24.

From there on, it was the Pardeep Narwal Show as he continued picking off player after player in his 10-point second half showing. With the score at 29-27 in Patna Pirates’ favour, Pardeep Narwal got Prashant Kumar Rai followed by Tae Deok Eom’s tackle on Jadhav which left only Nitesh Kumar on the mat for U.P. Yoddha. Pardeep then got the final point to inflicting another All Out on them to increase Patna Pirates’ lead to seven points at 35-28. Rishank Devadiga tried his best to force a comeback but Pardeep kept chipping away with raid points to effectively end any U.P. Yoddha attempt at a comeback.

Visit the matchcentre to relive the contest here.

With four minutes left, Pankaj managed to tackle Pardeep Narwal to briefly ignite another hope of a comeback but Deepak Narwal successfully raided four times in the last four minutes to complete a Super 10. Jadhav got the final two points that U.P. Yoddha scored in the match to finish with 17 raid points as Patna Pirates secured a 43-37 win.