The Pro Kabaddi League season 2 started with a bang as U Mumba beat Jaipur Pink Panthers by 29-28 in a mouthwatering clash and in the second match Bengaluru Bulls beat Bengal Warriors 32-25 in Mumbai. It was watched by full capacity crowd and celebrities like Mr. Sonowal, Minister for Sports GOI., Mr. Devendra Fadnvis Chief Minster Maharashtra, Amitabh Bachan and his entire family, Kapil Dev, Amir Khan etc were present in the inaugural match between Jaipur- Mumbai.
In the first match between U Mumba and Jaipur Pink Panthers the match went down to the wire. The match began with Anup Kumar going for the raid as he failed to collect any points. The first points went to Mumbai Rishank Devadiga who got Rajesh Narwal out in second raid. Panthers’ Naveen Gautuam got his counterpart out with ankle hold to level the scores. In the first half U Mumba raced to 7-2 lead through Shabber Bapu, yielding 3 points. But Jaipur made a good comeback taking for the first time on 16.20 minutes and a lead of 13-12 with a Rajesh Narwal raid and then moved ahead to 14-12. Mumbai came back into the game by equaling at 14-14 by Jeeva Kumar holding the leg of Jasvir Singh. Jaipur took the lead again in 19th minute to make it 15-14, but 30 seconds before Jeeva Kumar Mumbai took 2 points to take a 16-15 lead at halftime.
The first point of second half went to Kuldeep Singh to level the score at 16-16. Jeeva Kumar scored 3 more points and gave Mumbai continuously to take a 19-16 lead. Jaipur made up one point. Mumbai then took 2 more points to make it 21-17. Again Jaipur took 1 point and Mumbai 2 points to make it 23-18. Jaipur got out Shabber Bapu and held a protest, Bapu was adjudged out as Mumbai lead 23-20. Jaipur Pink Panthers made a great comeback in the game by getting an all out and bonus to give from being 20-23 down to Jaipur 24-23 lead. Mumbai took a technical time out. After the time out both teams took 1 point to make 25-24 in favor of Jaipur Pink Panthers. Jeeva Kumar and Vishal Mane did not allow Narwal to comeback as Mumbai equaled at 25-25 in 35.12 minutes. Mumbai Anup Kumar raided successfully to make it 26-25 in favor of Mumbai. After that both teams took 1 point to make it 27-26. Jasvir Singh was caught out as Mumbai took 3 points lead to make it 29-26. At the end Jaipur took 2 points still trailing by one point at the hooter. Mumbai won it 29-28.
Jasvir Singh did a good job for the Jaipur Pink Panthers and Anup Kumar also performed well for the U Mumba team.
In the first half Bengal Warriors began off to a great start with an all out. Bengal Warriors Nilesh Shinde and captain Dinesh Kumar got the players out in first 9 minutes to give Bengal a 12-2 lead. Bengaluru Bulls took 3 successive points to make it 5-13. Bengaluru Bulls came into the match and within minutes Bulls were trailing by 12-14 after Ajay Thakur got the Bengal Warriors team all out. Bengaluru Bulls by raiding successfully to make up the ground lost to reach 14-15 and even equlled at 15-15. Bengal Warriors led 16-15 at halftime.
In the second half Bengaluru Bulls went on 13-4 run as Manjeet Chillar got 4 players out in the 28th minute. The Bengal Warriors tried to make a comeback in the game as Jang Kun Lee , Nilesh Shinde and Dinesh Kumar were not able to match the speed of Bulls. Bengaluru Bulls raided successfully and took 4 people out to make it 27- 18. Bengal Warriors took 2 more points to reduce the gap to 20-27. Bengalru Bulls won their first match of the season 33-25.
In the Bengaluru Bulls and Bengal Warriors match Nilesh Shinde was the top performer for Bengal and Manjeet Chillar was top performer for Bengaluru Bulls.