Move aside The IPL and the CLT20, because here’s the world’s first ever ‘˜Pro Kabaddi League’. The game of kabaddi has been played in India since ancient times.
Move aside The IPL and the CLT20, because here’s the world’s first ever ‘Pro Kabaddi League’.
The game of kabaddi has been played in India since ancient times and is most revered in and around the villages.
Anybody hardly knows that there’s a World Cup scheduled too for a sport like kabaddi and the likes of China and Sri Lanka too participate in it.
Such is the popularity of the sport that the organisers (Mashal Sports) along with Star Sports decided to go the IPL-way and manage India’s first ever, #ProKabaddi League.
So what is Kabaddi?
Well, unlike cricket and hockey, Kabaddi is more of ‘contact’ sport that involves two with either side consisting of seven players each. The sport is held on a 1,400 sq foot area which is divided in two halves. A kabaddi match lasts for 40 minutes with each team sends its own player into the opposition half (raider) who is given the control of touching as many as opposition players and return back to its own. But while doing that, the opposition defense defenders can stop the raider from returning, by hurling him down.
However, the Pro Kabaddi League has tweaked the rules by introducing two halves of 20 minutes each with a five-minute interval. Plus there will 10 players on the bench as substitutes. At the start of the game, only seven players will the field, while the remaining players will sit on the bench.
Teams
The #ProKabaddi League has introduced eight franchises in its inaugural year which are –
- Bengal Warriors – owned by Future Group
- Bengaluru Bulls – owned by Kosmik Global Media
- Dabang Delhi – owned by Do It Sports Management
- Jaipur Pink Panthers – owned by Abhishek Bachchan
- Patna Pirates – owned by Rajesh Singh
- Puneri Paltan – owned by Insurekot Sports
- Telugu Titans – owned by Veera Sports
- U Mumba – owned by Unilazer Sports
Out of the eight sides, there’s a Bollywood-factor attached to as well with Abhishek Bachchan as the owner of the Jaipur Pink Panthers.
Points system
Well here’s the point system that will be used in the Pro Kabaddi League. Every team scores one point for raiding the opposition or defending its own half. Here’s the new deal where if the side manages to get all the opponents out, it will be called ‘All Out’. In such a scenario, the team is handed two extra points. If a team’s raider is caught by only 3 defenders or fewer than that, then the defending team gets 2 points. There’s a league table in place where a winning team will walk away with two points, while the losing teams is handed out no points at all. After the end of the group stage matches, the top four teams will make it to the semi-finals.
Cash prize
The sport of Kabaddi may not be amongst the riches of cricket but it still fancies it chance.
The winning team of the Pro Kabaddi League will be awarded a cash prize of Rs 50 lakh, with Rs 25 lakh going for the runner-up team. There are rewards for the semi-finalists as well with Rs 12.5 lakh in the pipeline.
So how the success of the Kabaddi League pans out remains to be seen till then keep chanting, “kabaddi, kabaddi…”
