Pro Kabaddi League: Telugu Titans record first win

Riding on Monu Goyat's all-round performance, Telugu Titans recorded their first win of the season with a 30-21 verdict against Patna Pirates

Hyderabad: Riding on Monu Goyat’s all-round performance, Telugu Titans recorded their first win of the season with a 30-21 verdict against Patna Pirates in the second game of the day at the Shree Kanteerava Indoor Stadium in Bengaluru on Tuesday.

The win lifted the Titans off the foot of the table and instead consigned the Pirates, last year’s runners up to a second straight loss. The pregame talk was centred around the watertight defenses of both teams, and with Mohammadreza Shandlu on the Patna Pirates team sheet for the first time this season, the hype was all the more real. Shadlu was the defender of the season last time around.

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And yet, for all the talk, the opening quarter of the match was dominated by the attacking verve shown by both sides, Monu Goyat and Sachin, trading blows throughout to keep the scoreboard ticking. The two teams traded 13 points before the Pirates registered the first tackle points of the game.

From thereon though, the Titans, and Goyat, took over. The experienced raider kept nibbling away at the Pirates defence, snapping bonus points at will. A close game was suddenly blown open by a Super Tackle by the Titans to take a 10-9 lead. Their narrow lead was consolidated further in Goyat’s very next raid, his two-point raid, registering the first and only All Out of the match. Telugu Titans went into halftime leading 21-13.