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#5 Coach Baskaran and Ajay Thakur inspire Thalaivas to win a thriller
The Tamil Thalaivas looked to be heading for another agonizing defeat after having done so well for 80% of the match. They had conceded the lead to the Bengal Warriors late on after suffering an All Out, but were still rallying. They had brought a 3-point deficit down to two and soon after, just one point inside the final minute of the match.
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Maninder Singh's empty raid left five seconds on the clock, enough time for one final raid. With the game on the line, Thalaivas coach K. Baskaran called a timeout and we got to listen in to what he had to say to his captain and star raider Ajay Thakur. He told him to move towards Ran Singh in the right corner, feign movement in his direction to draw a tackle from him and perhaps get a second touch point from another defender who might come to help. He also asked him to target one point first and then maybe look for another as that would get them at least the tie. Ajay took it all in, put on a wry smile towards the end and mentioned that he would try and improvise if possible.
As the whistle blew for the action to resume, Ajay followed exactly what his coach had said and targeted Ran Singh in the right corner. He waited patiently for the error, however, it wasn't forthcoming. As he moved left to get something elsewhere, the left defender came rushing in. Ran Singh too left his line because his teammate had done so. Ajay got touches on them both, bounced off of them and fell back over the line as the Thalaivas leapt in jubilation, the two points giving them a narrow one-point win right at the death.
The inputs from Baskaran were timely and accurate, Ajay Thakur was the perfect man to pull off the heist in that moment. It provided an almost sports movie type ending to this contest as we got to listen in to the plan before it was actually executed. A gutsy, gutsy raid from Ajay Thakur to close out what was an absolute thriller of a contest.
