Puneri Paltan emerged victorious in a seesaw-like thriller over the arch-rivals U Mumba on a 36-34 final scoreline. Paltan’s gun cover defender Abinesh Nadarajan starred in a two-point thrilling win in the second chapter of Maharashtrian Derby as Ajith Kumar’s diligent efforts went in vain with U Mumba ending the day as the losing side.
Puneri Paltan gaffer Anup Kumar did not make any changes to continue the great run from the core and kept the Himachali corner duo of Vishal Bharadwaj and Baldev Singh away from the lineup. While U Mumba replaced dropped Ajeet Chahar who had a disastrous previous fixture and replaced him with right cover Sunil Siddhagawli. Sunil made a comeback to the Starting 7 that too against the franchise from his homeland Pune.
The Ahmednagar boy Aslam Inamdar kick-started the Maharashtrian Derby with a multi-point raid by dismissing Rinku and Harendra in his first attempt. Although the second raid of Aslam was anticipated at the right corner by another Maharashtrian stalwart, Siddhagawli. Then the Mumbai-based franchise took a vigorous momentum early at the clock as even a Super Tackle by Abinesh Nadarajan could not save them from the all-out infliction.
At this point, all three tackle points from the Puneri Paltan side were scored by the youngster Abinesh. All-out at the 12th minute gave U Mumba a four-point lead which was reduced to only one, credits to Inamdar’s incredible Super Raid at the end of the first half action. But the Tamil Nadu striker could not stop Puneri Paltan from inflicting their first all-out of the match in crucial moments of the game.
The second half action commenced when Nitin Tomar went for his first raid of the match and the Pune captain was able to score a touchpoint in that attempt. V Ajith Kumar continued the flow of raid points for Mumba and the raider eventually achieved his third Super 10 of the season. This phenomenon brought Paltan into the driving seat as the Pune-based franchise entered into the last 10 minutes with a four-point lead.
It was time for the tactical masterclass of Anup who directed his players to slow down the game’s pace and protect their tiny lead. It all came to the last raid of the game when 29 seconds were remaining on the clock and Mohit Goyat went for a Do-or-Die raid. Mohit was on nine raid points and had a chance to complete Super 10 but the youngster wasted all 30 seconds as instructed by the genius skipper Nitin and ensured Paltan’s double over Mumba.
Ajith Kumar scored a marvellous Super 10 in a losing cause
After coming through the ranks of Yuva Paltan, Abinesh has claimed 37 tackle points in 14 games as Pune’s only representative in the Top 15 list. He was out of the court only once throughout the 40 minutes and contributed 6 tackle points including two game-changing Super Tackles.
As usual, Aslam Inamdar was on fire in the first half but failed to sustain it in the second half. While the highlight of the second half was Mohit Goyat who also won ‘The Gamechanger of the Match’ award after sacrificing himself for the team’s cause in the decisive raid of the game.
Despite the foiled outing, U Mumba retained their stance in the Top 4 of the points table with five wins, five ties, and five defeats from the 15 fixtures of the season eight. While four consecutive wins have bolstered Puneri Paltan’s contention for the playoffs qualification as they are currently standing in the seventh position with equal number of points (42) as the sixth-placed UP Yoddha side.