Puneri Paltan
The loss against the Bengal Warriors in the dying seconds of the match would have hurt Puneri Paltan. They held a four-point advantage with under a minute to play and ended up conceding a five-point raid to Mohammad Nabibakhsh.
These are the kinds of moments that define a season and Puneri Paltan has not been winning them. Pankaj Mohite started the previous match in the absence of Nitin Tomar and ended up scoring a brilliant Super-10.
He, along with Manjeet, will need to lead the Puneri Paltan offense against The Gujarat Fortunegiants as well.
Manjeet is, in fact, a decent all-rounder and contributes in the defense as well. Girish Maruti Ernak and Surjeet Singh will want to forget about the lapse in the previous match and come back stronger. They are both very good and have Hadi Tajik to depend upon as well.
Gujarat Fortunegiants
There were a few positives and some very pressing concerns to take from the previous match for the Gujarat Fortunegiants. They were up against a strong UP Yoddha side and needed their senior players to stand up.
Sachin Tanwar answered the call with a Super-10 and Sunil Kumar managed six tackle points but no one else did anything of note. Rohit Gulia failed to score a single touchpoint from his 11 raid attempts, Parvesh Bhainswal was left empty-handed in the defense, and there were just too many errors for the side to be able to win.
This is not going to be acceptable against Puneri Paltan. The Gujarat Fortunegiants need all of their top-players to be pulling in the same direction and pay well in the same match.
If they mistake of underestimating Puneri Paltan then they may find themselves closer to the bottom of the table very soon.
The Gujarat Fortunegiants hold a very handy 6-1 lead in head to head matches against Puneri Paltan. A win in this match could help Puneri Paltan jump to 8th on the PKL league standings, tied on points with the Gujarat Fortunegiants.
We think the Gujarat Fortunegiants are showing some good signs in recent matches. The return of Sachin Tanwar to point-scoring form is very important. Their defense is strong enough and experienced enough to bounce back.
Bet on the Gujarat Fortunegiants to win.