Internet Desk: Haryana Hammers posted their second consecutive win in the second edition of the Pro Wrestling League by defeating UP Dangal 5-2, on Wednesday.
Haryana Hammers won the toss and decided to block the men’s 74kg category, while Uttar Pradesh team chose to block women’s 58kg, thereby denying the spectators a chance to watch much fancied Geeta Phogat in action against Rio Olympics bronze medallist Marwa Amri of Tunisia.
The Phogat sisters — Geeta and Babita — have been in the limelight after the Aamir Khan-starrer biopic on their struggles, ‘Dangal’, has turned out to be a huge box office success.
But even Babita failed to make up for her sister’s absence from the mat as she was quickly handed a 0-4 defeat by fall verdict by Rio Games bronze medallist Sofia Mattsson of Sweden in women’s 53kg as Haryana Hammers took an unassailable 4-2 lead in the match.
Call it the ‘Dangal’ effect, the stadium was near about full and the title track of the Bollywood movie added to the excitement to action-packed evening at the K D Jadhav Indoor Stadium here. But the UP team could not capitalise on all the hype.
With foreign wrestlers like Magomed Kurbanaliev, Elitsa Yankova, Abdusalam Gadisov and Sofia Mattsson dominating the show, Haryana registered a comprehensive win.
However, it was not the star wrestlers who hogged the limelight today but the lesser known Indian girls in Indu Chaudhary and Kiran. Although both of them lost their respective bouts but not before giving a tough fight to two Rio Olympic medallists. They showed a lot of character and a never say die attitude during the two most keenly fought contests of the evening.
Earlier, the first bout was contested between Amit Dhankar of UP Dangal and Russia’s Magomed Kurbanaliev, representing Haryana, in men’s 70kg.
The 2016 World Championship gold medallist Magomed began aggressively, scoring points early on to make life difficult for the Indian and went into the break with a comfortable 4-0 lead. The Russian continued to dominate in the second round also and eventually sealed it off with an easy 8-0 victory.
The surprise package of the evening was the duel between Indu Chaudhary and Rio Olympics bronze winner Elitsa Yankova in women’s 48kg. The Indian grappler stunned one and all with the way she fought against her more experienced opponent.
Indu not just gave a tough fight to the Olympic medallist but also eked out one point in the first three minutes to take a 1-0 lead after round one. .