Telugu Titans finished its league campaign on Tuesday with a comprehensive 46-25 victory against table topper and defending champion Patna Pirates to finish second and confirm its place in the semifinals. Patna, though, remained on top with 52 points, two more than Titans.
Captain Rahul Chaudhari led Titans from the front, scoring 13 points. With effective support from substitute Athul, Rahul managed to outwit the opposition.
With the teams level till the 13th minute, Titans pulled ahead when Athul sent out two of the Patna players and reduced them to just two on the mat. Chaudhari struck again and Iranian Hadi Oshtorak was tackled successfully for Pirates’ first all out.
Pirates did not recover from that setback and kept falling back. At half-time, the Patna side was 10 points in arrears. The gap kept widening as its defence was completely exposed by Athul and Chaudhari. Between them, the two raiders stepped out 27 times and were tackled only twice.
On the other hand, Patna should thank its Iranian duo of Abolfazel Maghsodlo and Fazel Atrachali for saving them the blushes.
The duo scored 17 of the 25 team points and did well in both attack and defence.
Pardeep Narwal, Patna’s talismanic raider, was off-colour and his inability to score was reflected directly in his team’s struggle.
While three of the four semifinalists have been decided, the race for the fourth spot is wide open.
The result: Telugu Titans 46 (Rahul Chaudhari 13, Athul 7, Sandeep Narwal 6) bt Patna Pirates 25 (Abolfazel Maghdoslo 9, Fazel Atrachali 8).
