Pro Kabaddi Season-2 kicks off today

The Season 2 of the eight-team Star Sports Pro Kabaddi League kicks off here at the NSCI Stadium on Saturday with hosts and last year's runners-up U Mumba clashing with defending champions Jaipur Pink Panthers.

The fans of this rustic, rural sport that originated in the sub continent and is an Asian Games discipline in which the country bagged its only gold medal in the 1990 Beijing Asiad, are keeping their fingers crossed that Season 2 lives up to the promise of the inaugural edition held last year.

The novelty of watching this game on a synthetic indoor mat instead of its traditional mud pitch outdoors was one of the reasons for its success last year. For this season squad strength of each outfit has been increased from 14 to 25 to allow teams greater freedom to not only field local and young talent, but to also ensure that they are not adversely affected by injuries. The first leg of the season is scheduled to run from Saturday up to July 22 after which the action is to shift to Kolkata, home of the Bengal Warriors. Subsequently the league would move on to Jaipur, Patna, Hyderabad, Delhi, Bengaluru and then Pune.