Bhupender Singh turned out to be a rescuer as his last minute effort secured U Mumba a 27-22 win over Dabang Delhi in the Pro Kabaddi match at the Pataliputra Sports Complex here on Saturday.

This win makes it seven in a row for U Mumba, with 35 points at top of the table. Dabang Delhi also earned a point to but couldn’t mantain their fourth position.

The tall Bhupender, adjudged raider of the match, gave the cutting edge to U Mumba’s attack. He came in when his side was trailing 6-9. He succeeded in first creating a big impression with a super raid to equalise and then went on to score seven points from ten raids to boost Mumba’s score when they were searching for options while their three raiders Shabeer Bapu, Rishank Devadiga and Captain Anup were on the bench. The youngster responded admirably to help the front-runners maintain their dream run.

U Mumba’s captain Anup Kumar was in full praise for Bhupender Singh.
“We started the match a little slowly and this put some pressure on us going into the second half, especially with Dabang Delhi leading by three points. This was why we made the changes, taking Shabeer off and bringing on the youngster Bhupender worked for us. This shows overall we have a good team and it’s a good feeling when the youngsters perform.” Anup said.

Dabang Delhi, who lost to Patna Pirates on Friday, kept the rival defence under constant pressure with raiders Rohit Kumar Choudhary and Kashiling Adake earning points at will. In the first half the duo contributed there points each. However, the real surprise came from the Delhi captain Ravinder Singh Pahal. His nine tackles for the match is a record, which he now shares with Jeeva Kumar of U Mumba.

Pirates win

In the second match of the day, Patna Pirates got the better of Puneri Paltans 32-28 to jump to fourth spot while Paltans moved up to sixth spot despite defeat.

points table

Teams     Mat     Won      Lost     Draw     Pts
U Mumba    7     7    0     0     35
Telugu Titans     7    5    2    0     26
Bengaluru Bulls     7    5    2     0     25
Patna Pirates    6    3    3    0     17
Dabang Delhi    7    3    4    0     16
Puneri Paltan    6    1     5    0     9
Pink Panthers    6    1     5    0     8
Bengal Warriors    6    1    5    0     8