Pro Kabaddi League Season 9 : Tamil Thalaivas Road to play-offs

Pro Kabaddi League Season 9 Tamil Thalaivas Road to play-offs

So, this is the last article of our road to playoffs series where we describe Tamil Thalaivas’ journey to the playoffs. For the other five teams, you can check the links below.

Tamil Thalaivas, owned by the parent company of ISL team Kerala Blasters F.C, entered the Pro Kabaddi League in the year 2017 but has been a very poor team as they finished last in three seasons and second-last in one, let alone qualifying for the playoffs.

This is their fifth season in the competition and this time around they have managed to change their fortunes and finish the group stage well by qualifying for the playoffs. They retained their top defender last season, Sagar Rathee, who has been in phenomenal form since the last season.

They also retained young raiders like Himanshu, Narender Kandola, and Ajinkya Pawar. Their team looked promising but lacked a good and experienced raider who can run the game. Then came the auction and they played a big bet on Pawan Kumar Sehrawat making him the most expensive PKL player of all time for a sum of INR 2.26 crores.

They also bought many other players in the auction. Luck is a very important factor in big tournaments like PKL and I think it was not in the favor of Thalaivas as their star raider Pawan got injured after the first match and was ruled out for the remainder of the season. They went into deep trouble as soon as the tournament started.

Their season didn’t start well as their lead raider got injured in the first match only and was ruled out. They needed some young raider to step up and emerge as the savior of the team and Narender grabbed this opportunity with both hands.

Tamil somehow managed to tie their first match of the season but lost the next two matches by a close margin. They then won one against Patna Pirates by a point, but faced two humiliating defeats after that win which put more pressure on them. The defense was playing decently but the raiders weren’t rising to the occasion and Narender wasn’t getting much support.

Suddenly, Tamil Thalaivas came back and won three out of their next four matches, and tied one against Bengal Warriors (41-41). They won their next match by a point against Puneri Paltan and then lost two close encounters. After 13 matches, they were not in a very comfortable position and didn’t want any more losses. Their 14th league match ended in a tie against Patna Pirates (33-33).

They won the next three out of four games again beating several teams but lost a one-sided match against Jaipur (41-26) in between. Their 19th match also ended in a tie with Dabang Delhi (37-37). They won their next two games by a good margin and confirmed their place in the PKL-09 playoffs for the first time ever in history.

The last league wasn’t a good one for them as they suffered a humiliating defeat against Haryana Steelers (38-61). The heroes for them this season in raiding were Narender, Ajinkya Pawar, and Himanshu, who didn’t let the team feel the absence of Pawan Kumar Sehrawat.

The defense was totally controlled and led by Sagar, their captain, who continued his top form this season as well. They finished the season with a total of 66 points, which consisted of 10 wins, 8 losses, and 4 ties.

If they want to have any chance of winning that trophy, they need to continue this form and beat U.P. Yoddhas on 13th December, 2022 in Eliminator 2 of the PKL-09.