Patna Pirates Pro Kabaddi Season 7 Team Analysis

The Pro Kabaddi Auction ahead of Season 7 was a highly anticipated affair with several teams looking to put together the remaining pieces of the jigsaw puzzle but also others looking to hit the reset button as they move forward with a completely new unit filled with new personnel. The auction wasn’t short of the star quotient either, with the likes of Monu Goyat, Rahul Chaudhari, Abozar Mighani, Sandeep Narwal, Nitin Tomar, Rishank Devadiga and Siddharth Desai all up for grabs!

There are positives and negatives when it comes to re-booting a side completely in an auction that has 12 teams vying for top players. On one hand, the purse available is significantly larger (teams like Puneri Paltan, Telugu Titans & UP Yodha had this luxury) than several other sides that have retained their core and that gives the team owners the ability to bully the auction a little and raise the price of players which competing owners definitely want back in their squads. On the other hand however, with 11 other teams vying for each player, the chances of putting together a balanced side from scratch become harder than when it was in an 8-team league and each team’s strategy tables have gotten smarter too with every passing auction.

Time to jump straight into our analysis of each team ahead of this Pro Kabaddi Season 7 and give you a detailed breakdown of the side with the strengths and potential gaps, which need to be addressed before July arrives. We at Kabaddi Adda have decided to detail each squad with a SWOT Analysis (Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities & Threats) to understand where they currently stand but also to give all Kabaddi fans an idea of where these teams could find room to improve as the season kicks off…and we certainly expect a few surprises too!

The 3 time Pro Kabaddi Champions, Patna Pirates, couldn’t quite replicate their title winning form in PKL 6 but it is far from a sinking ship, especially with Pardeep Narwal still steering the side and it’s fortunes. While Pardeep Narwal is still perhaps the most complete and successful raider in the league, the team has struggled defensively over the last couple of seasons and has lacked the consistency to support the raiding prowess at their disposal. The team retained Pardeep but also managed to hold onto men like Jawahar Dagar (right corner), Vikas Jaglan (all-rounder) and also one of their stars of the PKL 5 winning campaign, Jaideep (left corner).

The loss of a quality second raider in Monu Goyat changed the team last season but the addition of Jang Kun Lee and Mohd. Maghsoudlou offers variety and power to the line-up to support Pardeep’s wily raids.

The starting seven of this squad looks competent but Jang Kun Lee’s form has seen a decline over the last few seasons and Pro Kabaddi Season 7 could again be a case of Pardeep needing to impress with the solo act for the Pirates to put other teams in troubled waters! 

Defensively, the services of experienced left-corner, Surender Nada were highly sought after but it came at a hefty price of Rs. 77L, despite having been injured for most of PKL 6 and with limited match time since then in any National tournaments as well. Hadi Oshtorak returns to his old home too and the impressive Neeraj Kumar joins the squad as a right cover defender to bring more solidity to the middle of the pack. Mohd. Maghsoudlou has been waiting for an opportunity in PKL and will be raring to go but is an untested quantity at this level of play and the depth of the raiding unit doesn’t quite have much to write home about.

The starting seven of this squad looks competent but Jang Kun Lee’s form has seen a decline over the last few seasons and PKL 7 could again be a case of Pardeep  needing to impress with the solo act for the Pirates to put other teams in troubled waters!