At the Vishwanadh Sports Club in Vizag on Wednesday, the Haryana Steelers defeated U Mumba in an exciting match that went to the tie-breaker, the third in 12 games, to secure their first victory in the Pro Kabaddi League Season 12. Shivam Patare’s spectacular goal in the tie-breaker clinched the victory for the Steelers after a chaotic match between Ajit Chouhan’s Super 10 and Naveen Kumar’s game-changing Super Raid.
Ajit Chouhan opened the scoring with a successful raid, giving U Mumba a strong start against the reigning champs. U Mumba swiftly jumped up to a 5-0 lead after a few forceful tackles. The Steelers were under increasing strain, and after just over six minutes, they were given an ALL OUT, falling behind 2–12. In the current edition, this was the team’s fastest All-Out.
Ajit Chouhan kept up his impressive play, adding crucial raid points and applying pressure on Haryana. The reigning champions, however, started to rally. They cut the score to 8–14 at the tenth minute. Shivam quickly removed U Mumba’s main raider by tackling Ajit, and the Steelers took advantage of this by enforcing an ALL OUT of their own, cutting the deficit to 12-16.
In the last moments of the half, the momentum changed even further. Vinay’s outstanding raid drew the Steelers closer, and in the last three minutes, a fantastic tackle on Ajit made the score 19–20. After then, Vinay’s successful attack tied the score at 20-20. However, U Mumba held their composure and answered right away. They narrowed the gap to three points as a result of that comeback, and U Mumba entered the half with a slim 23–20 advantage.
In the first two minutes, U Mumba swiftly regained control and increased their lead to 24-21. In a Do-or-Die raid, Sandeep’s composed finish increased the lead to 26–21. However, Naveen Kumar came through with two pivotal raid points in the 15th minute, narrowing the score to 23-26 just when it appeared that U Mumba would pull away. Early in the final quarter, U Mumba took a 31–25 lead thanks to Ajit Chouhan’s quick completion of his Super 10.
The Steelers weren’t finished, though. In the seventh minute of the half, Naveen was still leading their assault and had closed the gap to 27-31. Then came the pivotal moment; in the last three minutes, Haryana Steelers took the lead for the first time in the game thanks to a spectacular raid from Naveen Kumar that resulted in an ALL OUT.
The drama only grew more intense when U Mumba managed a bonus point to tie the scores at 34-34. Shivam Patare’s successful attack put the Steelers ahead once more, but Ajit Chouhan swiftly equalized the score. Then, in a pivotal raid, Naveen stumbled, giving U Mumba the upper hand again. Ajit Chouhan attempted a Do-or-Die attack in the last seconds but was caught, allowing the Haryana Steelers to steal a point and cause a 36-36 tie, forcing a tie-breaker.
The Haryana Steelers scored the first goal in this, U Mumba’s second tiebreaker of the season. Both sides traded blows in short succession throughout the thrilling tie-breaker.
Sunil Kumar and Sandeep were the first to strike for U Mumba, while Ajit Chouhan added another raid to his total. But the Steelers rallied, with Jaya Soorya and Vinay contributing vital points before Shivam Patare delivered the game-winning Super Raid that eliminated Rohit Raghav, Sandeep, and Rinku all at once.
The pendulum was decisively flipped in Haryana’s favor by the game-changing goal, and the Steelers maintained composure to win a dramatic tie-breaker despite Mumba’s best efforts to rally.
