Both Gujarat Fortune Giants and Bengaluru Bulls come into this match after winning their last 3 matches.
This game promises to be a special one because the Bulls would not want to break their winning streak and Gujarat Fortune Giants have not lost any match on their home turf since Season 5. Who takes away a win tonight, is surely interesting to find out.
Playing 7:
Gujarat Fortune Giants: Ajay Kumar, Sunil Kumar, Parvesh Bhainswal, Sachin, Dong Geon Lee, Ruturaj Koravi, Sachin Vittala.
Bengaluru Bulls: Rohit Kumar, Ajay, Sumit Singh, Pawan Sehrawat, Kashiling Adake, Ankit Sandeep.
Substitutes used:
Rohit Gulia, K. Prapanjan, Mahendra Rajput and Amit from Gujarat Fortune Giants. Mahendra Singh, Harish Naik, and Ashish Sangwan from Bengaluru Bulls.
Toss:
Toss was won by the home team, Gujarat Fortune Giants chose the court.
Bengaluru dived right into the game by taking the first raid as well as tackle point, not giving a chance to the home team to score.
But, Gujarat Fortune Giants had a reputation to maintain. Five minutes on the mat and Sachin executed a successful raid, getting rid of the Bengaluru Bulls star raider, Pawan Sehrawat.
In the next raid, Dong Geon Lee too got rid of Kashiling sending another main raider from the Bulls on the bench. The successive raids by Sachin and Dong helped them carry the ball for the Gujarat Fortune Giants who got the Giants in a 1-point lead, 6-5.
In yet another attempt to clear a hurdle, Ruturaj got rid of Kashiling by showcasing sheer power on the mat and single-handedly lifting and pushing him off the mat.
With nine minutes to halftime, the scoreboard read, 8-5, in favour of the Gujarat Fortune Giants. The Bulls defence charged up and kicked back in action eventually getting the score to nine apiece.
They continued to play in form and two minutes before halftime, Pawan Sehrawat inflicted the first all-out of the night on the home team. Scoreboard 10-16, in favour of the Bulls.
At halftime, the score was 12-18 with Bengaluru Bulls leading against the Gujarat Fortune Giants, in Ahmedabad, the home turf of the Giants.
The Bulls had taken control of the game but, the Fortune Giants came back swinging in the second half. Fiveminutes after halftime, Sunil, the Gujarat Fortune Giants captain, executed back to back dashes on Pawan Sehrawat and Rohit Kumar, bringing the score to 17-19.
At 12 minutes, Kashiling out of a desperate attempt for the Bulls to stay in the lead reviewed his bonus point for a do-or-die raid but in vain; leaving only two men on the court for the Bulls.
The Bulls managed to survive a couple of raids on the mat but by sending Pawan on the bench yet again with 10 minutes to go, Gujarat finally inflicts the 1stall-out on the Bengaluru Bulls coming in a 1-point lead. 23-22.
The last seven minutes, the match was enticingly setup for a blockbuster showdown with both team trading blows after blows.
After a successful two-point raid by the star raider Pawan Sehrawat from Bengaluru Bulls and tackling Sachin in his raid, Bengaluru Bulls came back in lead by one point.
Rohit Gulia made a two-point raid and then, tackled Pawan Sehrawat sending him packing to the bench and coming to come to a single-point lead yet again.
Even at 90 seconds remaining, it was hard to call and nobody knew who was going to win. The match kept changing sides it seemed.
None of the teams looked ready to take defeat home. With three seconds remaining on the clock, Rohit Gulia entered for the last raid of the match.
As if, not to settle for a tie, he went for a bonus but got tackled by the ever-active Pawan Sehrawat. The referee awarded each with a point, with the score levelled at 30-all. Gujarat reviewed but in vain.
The match ended in a tie with a bit of controversy towards the very end as Rohit Gulia didn’t seem to have executed the bonus correctly.
With this match, Gujarat Fortune Giants proved the fact that they will not take defeat, and their undefeated record on their home turf continues.
The Bengaluru Bulls would be happy taking home a tie and that elevated them to the top of Zone B table with a fewer number of matches played.