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Day 2 of Pro Kabaddi Season 5 kicked off with a battle between two veteran-heavy teams in Jaipur Pink Panthers and Dabang Delhi. The Panthers, winners of the inaugural season, are under new leadership having roped in star all-rounder Manjeet Chillar during the auction. After a strong start though, it was Meraj Sheykh's Dabangs that emerged victorious in a thrilling contest.
The second contest was the blockbuster for the night featuring two of the most explosive raiders in the game with Rahul Chaudhari's Telugu Titans taking on the 2-time defending champions, Patna Pirates, led by Pardeep Narwal.
In a fantastic contest, the defending champions emerged victorious with a strong finish that saw them deny the Titans a second-straight win as well as Rahul Chaudhari his personal milestone.
#1 Delhi recover after slow start with some Iranian magic
It was the Pink Panthers that made the stronger start in the first game of the night as they jumped out to an 11-4 lead midway through the first half after a super raid from Jasvir Singh.
Jasvir was out on his very first raid of the night but recovered well to inflict damage on Delhi with a massive raid in the first that removed both Bajirao Hodage and Nilesh Shinde. Dabang captain Meraj also spent a lot of time on the sideline unable to help his team.
That all changed in the second half as Meraj came into his own along with sound help in the raiding department from fellow Iranian Abolfazl Maghsodlou who came on as a substitute late in the first half. The two Iranians wreaked havoc with Abolfazl crucially getting Manjeet and Jasvir off the mat with two superb raids late in the first half that set the tone for his team's comeback.
Abolfazl had four points in all while Meraj finished with seven points overall. Nilesh Shinde, the former captain of the Bengal Warriors, had a strong defensive showing with five tackle points for his new team.
#2 Cruel blow for Selvamani and Jaipur
After a fantastic showing in the previous campaign, youngster Selvamani was bought for big money by the Pink Panthers ahead of season 5 for INR 73 lakhs. Expected to lead the raiding department along with Jasvir, the man from Tamil Nadu was primed for big things this year.
However, with his side up by seven points and on a seemingly straightforward raid, Selvamani went down on the mat as his right knee buckled and was tackled. However, the blow was more severe than just the point conceded by Jaipur as Selvamani did not return the rest of the game.
That left the raiding department depleted and put the load squarely on Jasvir. As Delhi's defence got better in the second half, Jaipur simply could not cope. It also forced Manjeet into going into raid more that saw the Delhi defence capture him more easily and keep him off the floor for large stretches in the second half.
#3 Neck and neck between Titans and Pirates
At halftime, the Pirates led 15-14 over the Titans. The biggest lead of the half was 2 points. The teams, led by their respective superstars Rahul Chaudhari and Pardeep Narwal, traded blows in almost every department.
Pardeep and Rahul both had two points, then they both had five points as they led the charge for their teams and the encounter lived up to its blockbuster billing. With both teams chalking up more raid points than tackle points, the encounter had a frenetic pace to it.
The second half continued in much the same vein with the Titans holding the lead for much of the half before Pardeep exploded towards the end to power the Pirates to the win.
#4 Pardeep Narwal turns it on in the closing stages as Patna break the game open
As mentioned earlier, this game was so tight for a good 70% of the contest. That was before Pardeep Narwal decided to turn it on and break the spirit of the Titans. He was unstoppable for much of the night, tackled just twice overall through the match.
His key contributions came right at the end. First, he engineered a Super Raid that reduced the Titans to just two men with just 4:43 left in the contest. He followed that up by taking the next raid as well in which he got the remaining two men out to effect an All Out.
A minute later, on a key raid, he got rid of Nilesh Salunkhe, a key raider for the Titans. With Rahul Chaudhari struggling, that was the death blow for the Titans.
Pardeep Narwal finished the game with 15 points leaving his opposite number Rahul Chaudhari behind in both points as well as his leadership and captaincy.
#5 The search for 500 derails Rahul Chaudhari and the Titans
When Pardeep Narwal was tackled for the first time in the match with just 30 seconds left in the first half and Vishal Mane received a yellow card early in the second for a pull of the jersey on Rahul Chaudhari, it looked like the Titans would pull away for the win. It was a completely different story in the end though.
Rahul Chaudhari's quest for that personal milestone of 500 points overall in Pro Kabaddi seemed to take more of the focus than the team's win. Twice towards the end of the first half, he was Super Tackled by Vishal Mane and the Pirates despite having just two men on the floor on one occasion. He was almost Super Tackled again in the second half but was let off after Mane had pulled his jersey.
Rahul had 19 raid attempts overall in this match while secondary raider Nilesh Salunkhe had almost 10 less. Of those 19 attempts, he scored just 7 points. On many an occasion, he tried for just the Bonus instead of going for touch points as his obsession with the 500 mark grew.
He and Pardeep Narwal were neck and neck for much of the night, but in the end, Chaudhari's quest for personal glory saw him get left behind on seven points while Pardeep finished strongly with 15.
He remains stuck on 499.
