Ahemdabad: In a highly thrilling and tightly played World Cup Kabddi final encounter between the two arch rivals which saw many ups and downs, Defending champion India showed its class and fight-back spirit to defeat Iran by 38-29 and lift the cup for the third consecutive time in a row here tonight.

India were down 13-18 at the half time but showed great fight back spirit in the second half and took lead of 24-21 with 10 odd minutes remaining by inflicting an all-out on Iran. Star raider Ajay Thakur scored his 10 raid points (super 10) with nine minutes remaining taking the lead to 26-21. Later a super tackle by Iran got it two crucial points to take the score to 27-24 but team India kept its cool and took the lead to 30-24 with five odd minutes remaining.

Another great raid by Ajay Thakur inflicted another all out on Iran which proved to be a deadly blow for Iran just about 3 minutes before the final blow of the whistle taking the score to 34-24.

India finally won the game by 38-29 with Ajay Thakur emerging as a superstar with maximum raid points to his credit.

In the earlier two editions of the World cup also India and Iran had locked horns for the title.

The current edition of the world cup is only the third one so far.

India had defeated Iran easily by 55-22 in the first Kabaddi world cup (international format) in Mumbai in 2004. In the second edition held in Panvel in Raigad district of Maharashtra in 2007 the two teams again reached the finals and have comparatively a tougher fight with India again lifting the cup by beating Iran 29-19,

India has reached the final after defeating Thailand 73-20 in the semifinals and prior to that it had won four of its five league matches. It had lost only to Korea in the very opening match of the tournament. Iran had defeated Korea in a closely fought semifinal by 28-22. It had also won four and lost one of its league matches.

The third edition of Kabaddi World Cup in Ahmedabad organised by International Kabaddi Federation at the Arena by Trasstadia had seen participation of 12 teams – India, Iran, Bangladesh, Japan, Korea, Australia, Kenya, England, USA, Thailand, Poland, and Argentina – battling it out for the world title.

India, which is also 7 times Asian Games winner,was in Group A with Korea, Australia, England, Bangladesh and Argentina While Iran with Thailand, Japan, the USA, Poland and Kenya were in Group B.

DeshGujarat