Pro Kabaddi League 2017 Season 5: "Tackling Pardeep Narwal thrice in a match is a huge achievement," says Anup Kumar
The Patna Pirates suffered a shock defeat at the hands of an in-form U Mumba in Saturday's crunch Pro Kabaddi League Season 5 encounter. In what was an extremely high-scoring affair, Mumbai registered a 51-41 win over the Pirates and temporarily catapulted themselves to second place on the points table, only to be overtaken by the Steelers.
Post their poor start to the campaign, U Mumba have now won four matches on the trot and redeemed themselves. In doing so, they sent a warning to the other sides in the league.
Mumbai captain, Anup Kumar was a relieved man after the game. The match got really close at one point during which there was merely a three-point difference. He stated that he was glad that Pardeep Narwal wasn't able to help Patna over the line.
"Our defense played well. Tackling a raider like Pardeep 3-4 times is a huge achievement. He has amazing technique," he said.
"The game got really close and when a guy like Pardeep plays against you, anything can happen. He can score four points in a single raid and that is exactly what happened. But we managed to score continuously," he said.
Anup reckons raiders from both the sides were in the mood to attack. The difference was Patna stuttered when it mattered the most while U Mumba kept chipping away with points throughout the game.
"Raiders from both sides played really well. Kashi had an outstanding performance, Shrikant also played very well. Darshan timed his raids well and scored when it was necessary for us."
"Our team has definitely mounted a good comeback, especially our raiders, who are playing very well. We will try to perform even better from now on," the captain stated.
Unlike previous games, U Mumba have been performing as one cohesive unit and it's paid handsome dividends on the mat. The captain is glad that the young players have taken up responsibility when the challenge presented itself.
"It's good that the entire team is playing well. I don't take too much pressure but when the team isn't performing, responsibilities increase. Now all our players are doing well so there is no tension. As a senior player, I am spending time on the mat and I am satisfied," he said.
It was truly an all-round performance from U Mumba. Kashiling Adake led the attack, scoring 15 raid points. New kid, Shrikant Jadhav managed an impressive 13 raid points as well. Darshan chipped in with 8 vital points. While in defense, the usually hyper, Surender Singh managed to score 4 crucial tackle points.