PKL 2019 | Our raiding cost us the match, believes Ram Mehar Singh

08/04/2019

Patna Pirates coach Ram Mehar Singh is of the belief that it was their raiding unit, in last night’s match, that wasn’t up to the mark and led to their defeat as well. He also added that the defence won’t be able to pull the match until and unless it has support from their raiding department.

Patna Pirates has showcased mixed performance till now as they have lost two of their matches and won the other two. In the last night’s game, the team didn’t look sharp and lost to Jaipur Pink Panthers by 13 points. In the first half, their raiding wasn’t able to score much and same goes for the defence as well.

“This result does feel disappointing. Our raiders weren’t able to do well consistently and the defence, too, made some mistakes. But I feel it was our raiding that cost us this match today,” coach Ram Mehar Singh said in the post-match press conference.

Their defence only managed to score seven points as compared to the Panthers' 17 whereas both their raiding department scored the same points in the match. Panta’s skipper Pradeep Narwal got his form back in the second half and ended up scoring nine raid points for his team but even after this, the lead was unattainable and he wasn’t able to close the gap.

“If we have only a few raid points in the first half then the defence can’t really pull things back on their own,” the coach added.

There was a moment in the match, few minutes into the second half, where the Panthers were on the verge of an all-out and had only three players on the mat. However, Pardeep went into the raid but got super tackled by Amit Hooda and after that, the Panthers were able to recover quickly and deflected the all-out.

“Yes, I think that moment was quite vital. If we were successful at that point we could have taken the match down to the end,” skipper Pardeep said.