The Season 6 Champions of Pro Kabaddi, the Bengaluru Bulls have ticked several boxes and come into Season 8 in great shape with their lead raider Pawan Sehrawat now getting support in the form of Chandran Ranjit & more able raiders.
The Bengaluru Bulls retained their super-star lead Raider Pawan Sehrawat ahead of the auction, who can pretty much deliver at least 10 points per game in every match of the league. He’s proved to be not only dependable and also a credible leader of the raiding squad who likes to take responsibility upon himself. What spells danger for the other teams this upcoming season is that Pawan also now has excellent support raiders in the Bulls’ setup.
Overall Squad Rating: 7.5 / 10
The lead raider being on the mat for more than 70% of the raids is possible only if he has a shoulder to lean on in the form of a support raider. Chandran Ranjit did this task to perfection for Naveen Kumar in PKL7 and he will now play the role for Pawan Sehrawat in PKL8 and take charge of ensuring Pawan spends enough time on the mat. If Ranjit is not up to the task, they also have Deepak Narwal and the brute force of Banty too. This support squad could also ensure that the Bulls end up in fewer Do-or-Die raids. The icing on the cake is possibly the tall Iranian raider Abolfazel Maghsodhlo who has proved to be good in do-or-die raids and in pinching the Bonus points when on offer.
Corners form the pillars of any good defense in Kabaddi and with Amit Sheoran and Saurabh Nandal, the Bulls have experience and youth all rolled into one with two stable corners. They have invested in these youngsters by giving them enough match time in PKL7 to mould them into a good corner duo that have a great understanding together.
The Cover defense is perhaps the only small chink in the Bulls squad. They got back their mainstay Mahender, the left cover from Services, through the FBM card, but there is slim support coming from the right cover region. The right corner-right cover combination is what usually proves to be a threat to right raiders like Naveen Kumar or Arjun Deshwal in so Coach Randhir will have to come up with a way to tighten the right cover region.
Coach Randhir Singh Sehrawat invests a lot in his squad and now it is payback time. He has been a match-winning coach for the Railways and the Bengaluru Bulls and has been the team’s coach from the beginning of Pro Kabaddi and the faith in the coach has paid rich dividends to the team. His ability to knit the young unit together, uncover players like Pardeep Narwal and Pawan Sehrawat is another big reason the Bengaluru Bulls are well placed to bring the cup back home in Season 8.
[Header Image Credit: Bengaluru Bulls]
[All Data Courtesy: Kabaddi Adda]
Suhail Chandhok
Vertical Head - Sports