Puneri Paltan

Deepak Hooda

We all know him as the raiding machine, but very few know he used to teach English and Mathematics to school children. Once when asked if not a Kabaddi player, what would he rather be doing, he replied he would be a teacher.

According to a speed test done in the sports science lab, Deepak emerged as the fittest Indian kabaddi player in the 2016 World Cup. A man of many talents!

Dharmaraj Cheralathan

Dharmaraj, who is fondly referred to as Anna by the team, is one of the most veteran & experienced players in the Indian Kabaddi scene! With over 2 decades of experience in the game, chances are, he already has a tackle planned for an incoming raid! It doesn’t end there! After 30 years, Anna represented India in the 2016 World Cup redefines persistence and patience.

Anna’s wife is a Kabaddi player as well and is a Maharashtrian from Pune! He was destined to play for Puneri Paltan

Girish Ernak

While in school, Girish’s PT teacher had him participate in the Inter-School Kabaddi tournament. Girish was new to the sport and completely clueless. However seeing his style, his teacher asked him to take up the sport professionally!

In his initial years, Girish had no idea about dietary requirements required for a close contact sport like Kabaddi and had no money for same. He used to distribute newspapers early in the morning & spent the money he earned from it on his diet.

Umesh Mhatre

The turning point for Umesh in his Kabaddi career was when he was playing Department National in the finals and took 2 crucial points and caught Jasveer Singh from the corner. This moment had a huge impact on Umesh as his team won the finals and from there he got a chance to represent Maharashtra after which Pro Kabaddi happened to him. There’s been no looking back ever since!

Sandeep Narwal

The Beast from the East as he is referred to in Pro Kabaddi League today was once not able to play in Haryana team & lost hope! As luck would have it, he got a chance to play for Chandigarh & got selected for Junior National Camp. This marked the beginning of Sandeep’s illustrious Kabaddi career!

Rajesh Mondal

The Do-or- Die specialist of the Paltan, Rajesh is a fury on the mat who can get us out of any tricky situation! His father, Ramen Mondal was a Kabaddi player and today coaches eastern railways Kabaddi team. That explains where his amazing Kabaddi skill set comes from! It runs in the family.

Rohit Kumar Chaudhary

Rohit Kumar Chaudhary has fond memories of Pune where he spent his formative years! He used to play for state, but could not qualify for Nationals and thus missed India camp! His hard-word paid off as he got to where he is today.

Suresh Kumar

Suresh played for Services and even after multiple matches didn’t get recognized! His zeal to perform and hard work made him an ace Kabaddi player, ultimately getting him selected for Pro Kabaddi League at the age of 31.

Ziaur Rahman

Ziaur has performed exceptionally well in his matches making the Puneri defence very strong!

What very few people know is that this Bangladeshi strongman used to play football & was part of his country’s U-14 & U-18 football national camp. If this is not enough, Zia, as we like to fondly call him, works for the Bangladesh Navy!

Takamistu Kono

Kono made waves during 2016 Kabaddi World Cup with his exceptional skills! What makes him stand apart is that apart from being an ace Kabaddi player, he is also a third generation Buddhist Monk!

Having started learning Buddhism at the age of 13, he works as a priest in his temple by day & plays Kabaddi by night! Kabaddi came in his life when he was 18 when he started playing for his University team at Taisho University!

Captain Deepak Hooda and his story

Deepak was the only player retained by Puneri Paltan in Season 5. That in itself was a big testimony to his performances, as big names including Manjeet Chhillar and Ajay Thakur, who had played a big part in Pune's revival had to walk through the exit door. But Pune, who were planning for the future, couldn't have picked a better man than Deepak to lead their side. The 23-year- old is the franchise's highest-scoring raider averaging 7.88 raid points per game with a strike rate of 45.48. The first stat is even more staggering considering he has played for the Pune side for just two campaigns. Let’s look at his story There are no short cuts when it comes to success and living your dreams. One such heart touching and inspiring story is the story of our ‘Rolling Raider’ and rock star, Deepak Niwas Hooda. His hard work, passion for the game, consistent performance and calm mind speak mountains about him. But, there’s a lot about him and his journey.

This young lad has his roots in Chamaria Village in Haryana’s Rohtak district. At the tender age of 4, young Deepak having lost his Mother began assisting his Father in the fields while he was still in school. Then in 2013, his Father passed away from an illness. In an interview, Deepak mentioned “My Father used to tell me to focus on my studies. He advised me when I got up at 3 am to practice Kabaddi before school. Sadly, today when I have made a name in the sport, he isn’t here to celebrate my success”.

Deepak grew from a boy to a man, in his early teens as his situation demanded such maturity from him. His testing time didn’t end with his parents’ demise. His sister’s separation from her husband meant he had to take care of her and her children. Being the sole bread winner of the family, Deepak began to teach in a private school part-time and work in the fields in the afternoon. With all this going on, he still had a burning desire to improve his game, he had the fire in his belly to chase his dream of making it big in Kabaddi. Deepak would spend the morning and evening on the field, perfecting his every move. That was a tough time, but is sure reaping a ‘bonus’ today.

Deepak, is the gentleman who gave up his studies to support his family and for the same reason started playing Kabaddi. He had to leave his 12 th grade mid-way, though 2 years after that he took admission in B.A. He once again left his studies to play Kabaddi and went on to join the Air India, from there he set foot into the World of Kabaddi professionally.

He played for the All India University tournament and won a Gold medal there. He also won a Gold medal at the senior level tournament in Patna, 2014. And this, was his gateway to Pro Kabaddi. Deepak’s glorious and most cherished moment was when he was selected to play for the SAF games, 2016 representing India and he has won a Gold medal there too. A man of Gold, we must say!

He dreamed to be an engineer, despite all his struggles and he didn’t give up on that. After joining the Air India, he began pursuing a Bachelor’s in science degree, by correspondence. His skill and consistency on the mat, his game as an all-rounder has won hearts across the City and back home. He once mentioned, when he goes back home, his fellow villagers come to the airport to pick him up. Also, the welcome is very special when he returns after a win!

After years of sleepless nights and hard work, Deepak Niwas Hooda stands a rock star today! What makes him stand out, is his humility and hard work. He never took a success to his head or a loss to his heart. At practice sessions, Deepak is the most focused, sincere and hardworking player. It’s wonderful how he respects the game so much, knowing his achievements very well! Deepak Niwas Hooda has been spellbound this season. Every raid he went for, he brought back glory. He makes it all look so easy! They say behind every successful player is a woman, a friend, a family, for Deepak Niwas Hooda, behind his success are his struggles. His struggles are a strong reason for his success.

A man who started playing Kabaddi years ago, looking at a few boys in his village, with a dream in his eyes that may be this will pull us out of our difficult situations. What he began to do as a solution for his problems, he fell so much in love with it that he only wanted to evolve higher in the game.

Rise of the Paltan

When the second season of Pro Kabaddi League ended, Puneri Paltan had won just 4 out of 28 matches in the two terms seasons combined. The team had finished rock bottom for second season running.

This didn’t dishearten them but coaxed them to strategize wisely and perfect their game to the hilt. While they worked on changing the game, a gift of 8 new players was added to the Team with the dream of bringing home Victory. Preparations and sweat went on and it was time to take on the battle, get on the field, and roar to protect the Maratha Valor. It was time for Season 3 and the Puneri Paltan began with a promise, a promise to emerge champions, ‘Khel Badlega’.

As the Season began, they took everybody by surprise with their moves, raids, super tackles and immense passion for the game. They played like true Maratha warriors; they won several matches, drew some and lost a few. It is indeed a moment of pride for the Paltan, who was once the Underdog, the unnoticed, who went on to earn the name of a tough contender in the League, this Season.

We saw them Roar, rise and shine and yes, they kept their promise of ‘Khel Badlega’. With their spirits high, energy levels soaring to touch the sky and much applause for their stunning performance, the Paltan ended this journey by clinching in the 3rd position in the Pro Kabaddi League.

The Maratha Warriors, the Puneri stars have certainly proved, impossible is nothing! With Grit and Glory, they are ready to put their next foot forward to win hearts and the Battle.

Zone A

Zone B

Updated after match 132

•      advanced to Qualifier 1
•      advanced to Eliminators
• Five points for every win
• Three points each if draw
• One point if a team loses by seven or fewer points
• Top three teams from each zone qualify for the playoffs
• SD = Score Difference

Overall results Pro Kabbaddi season

Tackled, The Board Game

Most of us have grown up playing many many hours of board games. When we were kids, we used spend hours playing monopoly (it was called Businessthen!) and Scotland Yard (when we became bigger experts of central London than cab drivers could ever be!). As we grew up, life was dominated by the likes of Scrabble and Chess. My younger sister on the other hand, disliked board games — we got nervous when she came, because all she did was throw the board and run away! This only made us love our board games even more.

We are older now and fallen in the rough characterization of ‘geeks’. We mostly do number crunching to spend our days and discuss the results in the evenings. So obviously when Ram, a summer intern (another geek) suggested, lets make a board game out all this analysis — we pounced.

Goal: Lets build a board game to make Kabaddi popular.

Race or Elimination or Cooperation or Strategy Games?

We spent a good week or two debating this. In the end, Kabaddi solved this problem. Itself a game of strategy — where the current state of the game decides what happens next. So Tackled had to be a strategy game. How do we design rules for a good game? To do this we explored quite a few other games, but again the rules had to come from Kabaddi.

How many players? Two Player Game.

This was easy. Kabaddi is played between 2 teams and data from boardgamegeek.com shows that 2–3 player games might hit a sweet spot with our audience. We did explore a multi-player game where the teams travel across India to take ‘Panga’ against each other — however the rules did not flow well intuitively.

Rules of the Game? Kabaddesque all the way.

Two teams take on each other. Each team has 7 players on board and they take turns to raid. Now this the very unique design of Kabaddi where the game is defined by raid quantum rather than being a single continuous event. So players throw a dice to decide the number of moves they will make on the board — the chosen raider can take as many steps, touch defenders on his way. Here is the catch — even the defenders get to make as many moves to trap the raider in his zone of influence. So the raider needs to be clever about his moves and so do the defenders. If the raider or defenders get caught (based on their scores, inspired from the league performance) they need to sit on the bench, till someone from their team revives them. The player scores were carefully designed to allow to game to extend while having a consequential event often. The scores of raiders and defender can never be tied, by design.

The Board

The board is again inspired from the Kabaddi mat with two sides, a starting line for the raiders, Bonus line to get some additional points. There is also a lobby which gets activated with an action card. The action cards try to capture real events that happen on court like the coaching foul, getting injured in the middle of the raid.

Just playing the board game will make you an expert in Kabaddi rules, jargon and strategy without realising it.

Designing the Game

We got a design expert Anu on board to take our thoughts into reality. We decided to go on a rustic theme with few colors — black, white, red for the game. The board has a few cells which gives raiders/defenders advantages and incentives to go there. The player coins are wooden figures, designed by indigenous Channapatna artisans.

How does Tackled work as a game?

We have now tested Tackled with ~50 persons, some familiar with Kabaddi and some not. We have incorporated their feedback into fine tuning the rules of the game. Now to the open market!

Detailed Game Rules http://prokabaddi.messyfractals.in/en/skream-board-game/