U Mumba proved they are true challengers when they bounced back in style to force a crushing 41-20 victory over Telugu Titans in their first Inter-Zone match of the 6th Vivo Pro Kabaddi League in Pune on Tuesday.
It took U Mumba a few minutes to settle down and they were soon galloping ahead, their charge being led by the rookie revelation Siddharth Desai. Scoring with virtually every raid and backed by a strong showing from the rest of the team, including captain Fazel Atrachali, U Mumba never looked back.
U Mumbai earned 9 from the 11 raid points in the first half and a Toofani raid immediately on resumption. This is just an indication of Siddharth’s powerful display that saw him finish with 17 points from 19 raids, an 89% success rate. Siddharth also became the leading raider in the 6th edition with 83 points till Match 29.
When asked whether he keeps track of his scores Siddharth answered, “My scores do not matter only the result of my team is important.” He also added that Pune was like his home town and he was happy to perform well in front of the fans.
Captain Fazel was also a happy camper as he said, “I am very happy with the result. We needed this.”
After a slow start, which saw U Mumba trailing 3-6, it was a do or die raid by Vinod that helped keep U Mumba in the game and soon they had turned the deficit into an 8-3 lead, winning five points on the trot. With Siddharth Desai keeping the pressure on the rival defence with his precision raids, and the tight defence not allowing the rival raiders much leeway, U Mumba soon affected an all out to jump into a 13-7 lead. They quickly increased it to17-12 at half time.
Two more all outs in the 2nd half only showcased U Mumba’s presence of mind and soon it was just a matter of how big the margin victory would be as the Titans could do little to fend of U Mumba’s advances.
The star showing earned Siddharth the Perfect Raider award, while captain Fazel was adjudged the Ace Defender with 4 tackle points from 5 attempts. Siddharth’s toofani raid also won him the Moment of the Match award.
There was some consolation for Telugu Titans as Rahul Choudhary became the first player to score 700 raid points.