Manning the crucial left corner, Manjeet came up with six tackle points and another six from his precisely calculated raids for a tally of 12 points. He had admirable support from Ajay Thakur who garnered 11 raid points, six of them coming in the first half to keep his side in the hunt. Ajay exuded a lot of confidence getting his hand touches going.

The first half saw the Jaipur Pink Panthers lead 21-18 after inflicting an all-out over their rivals in the 6th minute. At 3-9 the Puneri Paltans had to pull out something special, and both Manjeet and Ajay rose to the challenge. Manjeet came up with a super raid of three points, and Ajay kept the score ticking with his deft hand touches. For the Panthers, it was the ability of the tall Sonu Narwal and the stocky Rajesh to draw mistakes from the rival defence that paid rich dividends. The deadly Rajesh in fact had two super raids to his credit. Sonu had one super raid in his tally of seven points at the break.

After resumption, it was a neck-to-neck affair. Puneri Paltans kept within striking distance and finally equalized in the 36th minute at 31-31, when Prashant Chavan got his first tackle point on Rajesh Narwal. Till then Ajay Thakur had a string of raids that yielded his team four points. Surendra Singh, the third raider contributed their bonus points to the tally. Rajesh and Sonu both upped their tally to end with 10 and 9 points respectively.

But the show stealer was Manjeet with his astute leadership and humongous all-round show. For the Jaipur side, Ran Singh was impressive with his all-round show. He had a super raid at a time when the teams were tied 27-27 but the two tackles by Manjeet on Iranian Mohammad Maghsoudlou clinched for his side crucial points to force a creditable draw.

(Also Read: Patna Pirates finish first leg unbeaten as Delhi lose all seven)