Pro Kabaddi League 2017 Season 5: Five talking points from Day 38 of PKL 5
The crowd at the Motilal Nehru School of Sports had the good fortune of seeing some of the best raiding of Season 5 as they were witness to several raiding stars dazzle on the mat on Saturday's Inter Zonal Challenges. First up, the Patna Pirates and U Mumba dished out a high scoring encounter where three raiders went beyond the Super 10 mark - one of them even notching 20 points.
But Patna's defence could hardly do any of the magic that their captain Pardeep Narwal seemed to be doing on the mat with his raiding as they committed errors aplenty to hand U Mumba the match.
In the other contest of the night, the Bengaluru Bulls were outplayed by the Haryana Steelers whose defence and raiding department worked in tandem to give them a seven point win over Bengaluru Bulls who continue to disappoint their fans.
Here are the five talking points from day 37.
#1 Kashiling of old returns
It was long coming and now it’s there. The form of Kashiling Adake had been a reason for worry for the U Mumba setup in the first few legs of Season 5. But not anymore. Over the last few matches, he has looked the mirror image of the Adake who won over kabaddi fans with his raiding when the league began.
After his match-winning performance against Jaipur Pink Panthers, Adake has gone from strength to strength and was in his elements on Saturday night as well. He was intimidating with his wide wingspan and always looked capable of getting a point with his running hand touch. It was heartening to see Anup Kumar trusting him with the most of the raiding on Saturday, making him the lead raider of the night while taking a back seat himself.
With Patna threatening a comeback in the last 10 minutes, Adake put in a heroic raid which he reviewed to get his team five points by eliminating the last two defenders of Patna Pirates to push their lead to 10. He even got the team a point with their last raid to take his tally to 15 points for the night.