PKL 2018 | Teams having strong defensive unit will do well in the league, asserts Pardeep Narwal
Patna Pirates’ star raider has stressed on the role of the defenders in the Pro Kabaddi League by saying that teams having a strong defence will do well in the league as it progresses. He also mentioned that there isn’t any pressure on the side being the champions for the last three seasons.
Patna Pirates have always had a good raiding unit in Pro Kabaddi League and the performance of their top raiders in last three seasons has made them the champions each time since 2015. Prior to the sixth season, they released one of their best raiders from the last edition – Monu Goyat - while Pardeep still continued in the side,
However, the skipper, in an exclusive interview to SportsCafe, has asserted that it’s the team’s
“We have got a good raiding unit and all know about it but our
Pardeep himself has 106 raid points from 10 games and is at the second position in that list of top raiders after U Mumba’s Siddharth Desai who has played one game more than the Patna skipper. Apart from the ‘Dubki’ king, Deepak Narwal and Manjeet have also done a decent job in the raiding department for the defending champions in this season of the league. They have also used Vijay, Vikash Jaglan and Tushar Patil as substitutes in a few of the matches but the moves weren’t much effective for the team from Bihar’s capital city. Manjeet and Deepak have 44 raid points each while Deepak has played only eight games in the season so far and Manjeet has featured in all of them. Pardeep missed only one game against Bengal Warriors because of the wrist injury and in spite of that, the Pirates managed to beat Bengal in a closely-fought battle at home.
When asked about the team’s raiding unit depending more on him, Pardeep replied, “Someone might step up as a raider in any of the games that
“I got injured in the first game of the home leg and had to miss one game. We were playing back-to-back matches in the home leg and I did take rest in that game but was on the mat for the rest of the matches as the injury wasn’t that threatening. Winning that close game against Bengal in front of the home crowd lifted our spirits. We enjoyed that victory more as the team did put up a good combined effort.”
© PKLLike many other teams, the Pirates also had a poor run in their home leg at the Patliputra Sports Complex as they won only a couple of games out of six that they played at home. The Pirates are at the third position of the Zone B points table with a total of 28 points from 11 games and have just five wins to its name so far in the competition.
“Home leg hasn’t gone well for almost all the teams in this season, UP didn’t win a single and Pune had a poor home leg as well. So, there hasn’t been any home advantage for the teams in the sixth season so far,” the ‘Dubki King’ explained.
“We will try hard to win at least seven to eight matches from here on in this edition. I think we have time in this league and if we continue playing well, we can manage to qualify for the playoffs. We are looking forward to winning three or four consecutive games from this stage which will make our progress easier.”
The Pirates had finished second in Zone B and then went on to win four matches on the trot to claim the title last season by getting the better of new-comers Gujarat
“There is no pressure on us being the winners of the previous edition of the league.
“Whatever we have achieved as a team it is all because of our coach. All credit goes to him and he is someone who keeps us focussed and the training sessions under him have been very productive for us and he makes us train hard,” the Patna skipper concluded.
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