Cochin: UP Yoddhas rode on their defenders to make a major upset as they outclassed U Mumba 34-29 in the first eliminator of the Pro Kabaddi League (PKL) season six at the Rajiv Gandhi indoor stadium here on Sunday.
Nitesh kumar collected eight tackle points for the Yoddhas and stopped the U Mumba's raiders from making easy raid attempts. Meanwhile, Srikanth Jadhav picked five points for the Yoddhas.
On the other hand, U Mumba's ace raider Siddharth Desai failed to click when it was needed most as he could only manage seven raids while his teammate Rohit Baliyan bought five raid points. U Mumba's skipper and star defender Fazel Atrachali took four tackle poonts in the contest.
Siddharth opened U Mumba's account with an easy raid but Srikath also responded for the Yoddhas to make the issue 1-1.A Siddharth gave another lead to his side with a successful raid attempt before being tackled by the Yoddhas as the score read 2-2 in the first three minutes.
Both the sides traded raid and tackle points in the next few moments as the score was once again levelled at 5-5 before Siddharth's unsuccessful raid followed by Srikanth's successful raid attempt gave the Yoddhas a marginal 7-5 lead. Yoddhas then inflicted an all-out to make the score 11-7 in their favour.
Yoddhas rode on some brilliant raid and tackle attempts by their players to extend their lead to 14-10 by the 12th minute. U Mumba witnessed consecutive failed attempts by its star raider Siddharth however, Darshan Kadiyan stepped up to fetch some points for his side. Some great tackles by the Yoddhas helped them taking a 18-15 lead by the end of first half.
In the second-half, Rishank continued to bring raid points for his side as the Yoddhas were leading 22-17 by the 25th minute. Srikanth and Siddharth's successful attempts handed one point to their side as the score read 23-18 by the 27th minute.
Srikanth continued to make some stunning raid attempts to help his side take a 26-19 leadA with just 10 minutes left. Darshan's another raid point and a successful tackle of Rishank helped U Mumba cut the deficit to 21-17 by the 32nd minute. U MumbaA then collected three points in quick succession while the Yoddhas fetched two points to make the scoreline read 29-24 by the 35th minute.
U Mumba's raiders and defenders then made some stunning attempts to make the score 28-32 with just two minutes to go.A Yoddhas comfortably picked couple of poonts in the last five minutes while U Mumba could only bring a single point as the former ran away with an easy 34-29 win.