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It turned out to be an outcome that nobody in the stadium would have predicted. Perennial whipping boys of the Pro Kabaddi League, the Bengal Warriors have looked ominous in season 5 and the U.P Yoddhas endured a lot of pain over the course of 40 minutes on Sunday.
The Warriors registered a massive 40-20 victory over a team that many would consider among the favourites to win the league. In doing so, Bengal scooped up their second win on the trot to begin their season and sent a warning to the other eleven teams in the league.
Post the game, Bengal captain, Surjeet Singh was especially delighted with Jang Kun Lee’s performance. The Korean scored seven raid points and was extremely confident when he stepped up to attack.
Also read: Pro Kabaddi League 2017 Season 5 : Miss playing at home, admits Bengaluru Bulls' Rohit Kumar
“Jang (Kun Lee) has been playing really well for our team. He is a really good international player. On the left-hand side, he is the best raider, there is nobody better than him. In India, Pardeep Narwal is a very good left raider, that’s it,” he opined.
Surjeet believes that Lee is the best international Kabaddi player in the league. He is glad that the star raider was retained into the side and is expecting similar performances from him, throughout the course of this season.
“There is no other international Kabaddi player like him. It’s great for us that he has been delivering consistently,” he added.
While many would consider the score line of 40-20 flattering, Surjeet admitted that he wasn’t expecting such a dominating performance from his side, given the fact that Yoddhas themselves are a competitive and solid side.
“I didn’t expect the match would be so one sided but I was confident that we will win. We weren’t concentrating on the margin of points. The defenders and raiders both played well tonight,” he said. “We had decided that our raiders will go all out in the opening stages. Our defenders had to play calmly for this. We had decided that we wouldn’t let go of any opportunity.”
Captaining a Pro Kabaddi team for the first time, Surjeet has learnt a lot when he played under the tutelage of Anup Kumar at U Mumba last season. The defender said he learnt a lot under Anup’s guidance.
“I learnt that one shouldn’t get too aggressive on the mat. We must react based on how the match begins. I always learnt to concentrate on the third raid more but it’s always a bonus if our raider gets a point in the first or second raid,” he explained.
