Pune Pride qualifies for IPKL semis by finishing league at top of the Pool A, Mumbai Che Raje struggle in Pool B.
Pune Pride won a close battle between the top two teams in the Indo International Premier Kabaddi League (IPKL) to finish their league matches on a high. The Pune franchise won eight out of ten matches to finish with 16 points and qualify for semi-finals.
The stellar performances of players like Amarjeeth Singh, Venkatesha and raider Abdul Sheikh, has helped Pune in their successful campaign so far.
“The team has performed extremely well in the league so far and our moral is particularly high after defeating Delhi in our last match, who is a topper of Zone B. We are hopeful to maintain our winning momentum when we play in the semi-finals,” Pune Pride’s star raider Abdul Sheikh said.
Pune Pride proved to have an upper hand in an engrossing battle, defeating Diler Delhi by 37-36 on the last day of the Mysore leg. This was the most awaited match of the league as both teams are leading their zones A and B respectively.
Pune dominated the first quarter by scoring 16 points against Delhi’s five points. Making a strong comeback, Delhi scored eight points in the second quarter against Pune’s four points, bringing the half time score down to 20-13 with Pune still having a lead of seven points.
Delhi continued their domination in the third quarter and scored 14 points against Pune’s nine points. However, Pune still had a narrow lead of 29-27 over Delhi. The last quarter was hard fought by both teams, However Pune managed to edge Delhi by one point even though Delhi managed to score nine points against Pune’s eight points.
Amarjeeth Singh for Pune scored the maximum, nine raid points whereas for Delhi, Sunil Jaipal scored nine raid and one tackle points.
After this win, Pune is leading Zone A while Delhi is also leading Zone B with six wins and one draw in nine matches with 13 points.
Another Maharashtra based franchise, Mumbai Che Raje are struggling in Pool B and are currently placed third among four teams after having eight points courtesy three wins and two draws after nine games. After a poor start, they won two games in a row before losing previous game against second placed Bangalore Rhinos. Now they have one game remaining against Haryana Heroes on Saturday.
The eight-franchise competition adopts the standard style of kabaddi format refined and popularised by the ProKabaddi League, with minor tweaks.
The opening phase of the IPKL (20 matches) were played at Pune’s Balewadi stadium between May 13 to 21. Seventeen games of the second phase took place in Mysore’s Chamundai Vihar stadium from May 24th to May 29.
The final phase in Bengaluru will begin in from June 1 and will have seven games including semi-finals with the grand finale scheduled at the Kanteerava stadium on June 4. A total of eight teams are in place namely the Bangalore Rhinos, the Chennai Challengers, Diler Delhi, Telegu Bulls, Pune Pride, Haryana Heroes, Mumbai Che Raje and Rajasthan Rajputs.
