PKL 2019 | Studs and duds of league so far ft. Naveen Kumar, Monu Goyat, and Abozar Mighani

Studs

Abhishek Singh, Raider, U Mumba

Naveen, Raider, Haryana Steelers

With Vikash Kandola missing out in the first two games for Haryana Steelers, Rakesh Kumar had full faith on young Naveen to take up the responsibility. He has taken up the challenge really well and in two matches he has scored 21 total points against two strong defensive teams Puneri Paltan and Dabang Delhi KC. Against the Paltan, he led the teams raiding unit to ensure a win with 12 raid points in the game. On the other hand, against the Delhi team, he was the only positive takeaway for the Steelers as he went up against the likes of Joginder Narwal, Ravinder Pahal, and Vishal Mane and registered nine points and fell just one short off another Super 10. 

A lot of people might argue that Bengal Warriors are a good raiding unit this year but one can’t deny the fact that Baldev Singh has played his part well enough in the defence this season. With 16 tackle points from three games, the right corner defender has every reason to be classified as a stud. He has made things difficult for the raiders in all the three games against Puneri Paltan, Jaipur Pink Panthers and UP Yoddha. He has already got two High 5s and which is better than the entire season last year where he had only one. 

Duds

Things went terribly wrong for Telugu Titans in their home leg as they lost all their four games at the Gachibowli Stadiium, Hyderabad. On one side, their raiders led by Siddharth Desai failed to perform while on the other it was their defence which also had a bad outing at the home venue. Last year’s skipper and one of the top performers at the left corner Vishal Bhardwaj managed to score only 10 points from the four games which is one of the reasons for their poor show in the first few games.

Abozar Mighani, Defender, Telugu Titans

Monu Goyat, Raider, UP Yoddha 

UP Yoddha have lost both their games in the season by big margins and they also stepped on to the mat without one of their senior players Rishank Devadiga. With the responsibility of being the top raiders of the team, Monu Goyat had two very bad games which affected the team’s performance as well. Against Bengal Warriors, he had collected only five raid points from 14 raids while this number went down further in the next outing against Gujarat Fortunegiants where he only got two bonus points and got tackled on four occasions out of eight total raids. Goyat has managed only seven points from two matches so far in the league.

When you talk about Patna Pirates, you talk about Pardeep Narwal. Although the team has done well with two wins from three games in the seventh season, the performance of their skipper hasn’t been up to the mark. Pardeep Narwal has only 18 points from three games which is way below his PKL career average of 9.95 per match. Pardeep had started off on a decent note in the first game against Bengaluru Bulls. I say decent because he took 23 raids to score 10 points. However, in the next two outings against Telugu Titans and Tamil Thalaivas, Pardeep was tackled five and six times respectively. Being the primary raider of the team, Pardeep failed to get points in Do or die raids time and again against the Titans which is a cause of concern for coach Ram Mehar Singh.