Mumbai: It has been an exhilarating 3 days of action packed kabaddi in the city of dreams, Mumbai has been just that, the realisation of a dream that was years in the making. A spiritual revival of the most ancient of games, a revival that has seduced us all over again, by appealing to our most primal of instincts-the fight to stay ahead.


Mumbai has been a wonderful host city, we’ve experienced bits of everything, the glitz and glamour brought by the biggest superstars of Bollywood and Television. We’ve witnessed the passion and rigour associated with Mumbai, the stadiums have been filled to capacity, the fans have cheered, sang and even danced. They have turned out in their thousands, braving the rain and cold to support the home team Unilazer Sport’s U Mumba.


On the very last day of action in the financial capital, the fans had made the trip down to the NSCI, buoyant from their team’s temporary but quickly fastening grip over top spot in the league. U Mumba went into their final home game undefeated, their opponents however, had not played a single game so far. It was a mammoth clash between arguably the best raiders in the league, the guile and wit of Anup Kumar up against the flamboyance and ferocity of Rakesh Kumar. Eventually Anup Kumar would come out on top as the more efficient raider, leading his team to victory.


The fans in the upper decks had been in their seats a whole half hour before the start of the game with their U Mumba branded fan accessories in hand they were making themselves loud. All poised and ready to give Mumbai a rousing goodbye. Before you knew it the teams were on the court, a couple of last minute words from Coach R.S Khokhar to Rakesh Kumar and we were ready to go. Surprisingly it wasn’t Captain Rakesh Kumar to begin the raid but Ravi Dalal. Anup Kumar got a rousing ovation as he crossed the line to begin U Mumba’s first raid and rightly so, he dismissed two pirates, riding the challenges to make it back across the line. It was however Rishank Devadiga who sent the crowds into a tizzy when he managed to squirm out of a challenge and send three members of the Patna anti into the outbox, U Mumba capitalised by then tackling down the sole surviving Ravi Dalal to put Mumbai in the lead and score their first LONA points on the night.



Rakesh Kumar seemed in the mood to put on a show for the folks as he displayed incredible agility in each of his raids, ducking and dodging remaining an elusive catch until the 13th minute when the 7 pronged Mumbai defence lunged forward and stopped him dead in his tracks. Mumbai were rotating raiding duties between Anup, Rishank and Shabeer, the Pirates however seemed to stick with Ravi and Rakesh. The match was tight and Patna had worked hard to pull themselves on level with Mumbai. On the stroke of the 18th minute, they dispatched Anup Kumar to score their first LONA points. The half ended level, 19 points each.


The second half began with Mumbai streaking ahead, again it was Shabeer who tagged two opponents before returning home to then help capture the prized Patna captain. The fall of Rakesh seemed to signal the collapse of the Patna team, as they were all dismissed shortly after and gave U Mumba their second set of LONA points on the night. The challenge presented by the storming Pirates seemed to be sinking, who were overly reliant on Rakesh Kumar to rescue the situation time and again. Patna really were starting to fall far behind, their defending looked disorganised and given the deficit they were forced to take more risks while invading. There was a slight resurgence as Patna managed to close the gap to just 3, before eventually losing out. They did however manage to score a key point for chasing down the match. The match ended 36-33 in favour of U Mumba who remain undefeated.