PKL 2019 | We gave away too many super tackles, admits Rohit Kumar

Bengaluru Bulls lost against Puneri Paltan 38-42 and this was the second instance in this season. Where on one side their defence failed, the raiders, who were doing well, were also not able to take advantage of the situation. The first half belonged to Pune as they were quick to inflict an all-out and maintain that lead. Though in the second half, when Bengaluru did get some momentum, they conceded three super tackles. 

“We gave away too many Super Tackles and we need to be able to make our advantage count when we have the opposition defence pegged down to three or fewer. That will be an area we will look to work on. The defence as well. We need to be more aggressive as a team and not go for solo tackles,” Rohit Kumar said while talking about their focus in the upcoming matches in the post-match press conference.

All those three super tackles were executed by Sagar Krishna. He managed to oust Rohit twice and Pawan Sehrawat once in those tackles. Apart from him, the other defender who managed to keep Bengaluru’s raiders silent was Surjeet Singh with six tackle points. He tackled Pawan thrice and managed to keep him quiet in the first half.

“Surjeet is an excellent Cover defender. We had discussed how to avoid getting tackled by him and maybe that hindered our natural game and took away our focus from the other defenders. Sagar Krishna was brilliant today. He was excellent for them in Super Tackle situations,” Rohit said while appreciating Pune’s defence.

The biggest bane for Bengaluru’s defence was Pankaj Mohite who scored 17 points and got out only once in the entire match that too in the end. His performance was more valued because apart from his only one point was scored. Even Rohit Kumar scored 14 points but wasn’t able to make that big of an impact because he was ousted six times.

“He is a brilliant raider. He played unbelievably well. He scored a huge chunk of their raid points. He has all the skills in the book. An excellent prospect,” Rohit said while talking about Pankaj.