U Mumba ended a three match losing streak. (Source: PTI)
For the past two days, Mumbai has suffered some enormous loss to property and lives as heavy rains hit the city. The normalcy of life has been disturbed in the city. But, the ‘Spirit of Mumbai’, a term that comes back every time an adversity hits the city, has kept its people going. Over the past two days, numerous people have opened their doors to strangers to help by providing food and shelter. However, a day after the rains forced a cancellation of Pro Kabaddi matches, normalcy returned to the kabaddi mat. U Mumba and Haryana Steelers met on Wednesday and like the city Mumbai which rose to fight the rains and returned to its normal gear, team Mumbai also channeled that Mumbai spirit to recover from three consecutive defeats at home to return to winning ways by defeating Haryana 38-32.
U Mumba haven’t made too many mistakes in the three matches that they lost. What is apparent is that they somehow lost grip over these matches in the dying minutes. Against Haryana, it looked like it might be the same story. U Mumba got off to a good start, as they had in the last three matches. They then started caving towards the end of the first half and the slide continued in the early stages of the second half, as has been the case in the last three matches. What happened after that, was the difference between the U Mumba of those three matches and the U Mumba that faced Haryana Steelers. Moreover, the Mumbai crowd, as Haryana coach Rambri Singh Khokhar would admit after the match, had an effect on the Steelers in the period when both teams were going neck to neck. It was an understandably depleted audience that came but the noise levels in the stadium was not too many bars below what is the usual.
Apart from all that, U Mumba captain Anup Kumar stated that there was also some help from the opposition on the day. “I saw during the warm-up,” said Kumar during the post-match press conference, “That Haryana players were a little overconfident. It looked like they were taking it easy because they had won their last two matches while we have been losing. So our strategy was to go all out from the word go.” That did look to be the case in the first half. Haryana Steelers were the side that made the first raid and U Mumba were able to get a tackle on far too easily. They could not find much success in attacks in the early minutes but Haryana were being tackled left right and centre in that period. Such was Mumbai’s dominance that the Steelers were down to two men even before the end of the first 10 minutes. They would have been all out at that point had it not been for Vikas Kandola. Kandola managed to gain points out of consecutive raids. But he had little support as the Steelers kept giving away points at the other end. Kandola saved the Steelers three times before finally cracking and the Steelers were all out for the first time. Haryana then started to step up and because of that U Mumba starte the second half with just three men.
Deepak Kumar Dahiya’s Super Raid then brought them down to one and U Mumba were soon all out. The score at that point was 25-22 in Mumbai’s favour. Kandola then sustained an injury during a raid because of which he had to be stretchered out. Despite losing their best raider, Haryana kept at it and soon, levelled the proceedings. For the next four minutes, the two teams were going neck to neck. What has been seen so far in Mumbai is that U Mumba fall behind after conceding a two point raid, a Super Tackle or something of that measure to go on and lose the match.
But this time, they turned the tables. A two-point gap finally emerged between the two sides when Mumbai managed a Super Tackle. “That was a turning point,” said the Haryana coach, “Until that point, we were able to some pressure on them. But after that, that pressure built on us.” Mumbai soon increased that margin to five points and then added one more. Anup Kumar then ensured in his raids that they eat up as much time as possible. He did the same in the last 20 seconds. He waited at the mid line, looking at the clock and stealing glances at the opposition defenders. He had got a knock on his head a few minutes back and that had him flinching a little as he stood there. Finally, he decided it was time and went back to his side of the mat. The official called for an end to the match and Kumar bent down, touched the mat and then his forehead. U Mumba braved the storm and came out as victors.
