The Blank Scorecard: Why a Kabaddi Report Written on Cardboard Fails

On a Pune afternoon at the Balewadi press box, something strange happened. Puneri Paltan's home leg was on, and the scoresheet in front of me had the score printed, but the three lines below it — raid points, tackle points, who did what on which raid — were blank. The scoreboard was running, the crowd was roaring, but the paper I was supposed to build my report on was hollow like cardboard. It struck me that this is exactly what is happening to kabaddi coverage today: the result is printed in big letters on top, and the story underneath is missing.

This article is about that emptiness. A few days ago, an analysis reached me that labelled kabaddi as a 'domain' but contained no concrete information inside — no player name, no match date, no statistic. Only one tag: 'kabaddi'. And based on that tag alone, I was expected to write a deep analysis. I said clearly that this was impossible. But that empty framework gave me a big question, one that is very real for kabaddi journalism: when there is no material, do we build a story out of the result?

In kabaddi, this habit is old. Before 2026, when players depended on railway jobs and police uniforms, newspapers printed 'who beat whom' more than the score. The detail of the match — which raid changed when, which defender broke the line at what moment — stayed in the press box diary. After the Pro Kabaddi League (PKL) arrived, money came, cameras came, but the habit of reporting stayed the same. We mistook the scoreboard for the story. To me, this is like a cricket report printing only 'India 250 for 300' and the reader thinking he has been told the whole game.

In this year's tournament cycle, the problem has intensified. After every big event, we get a fixed language: 'India's gold is certain', 'beating Iran is guaranteed', 'kabaddi is our national game'. These sentences come from habit, not data. August 31, 2026, Jakarta — I was there. In the men's semifinal, India lost to Iran 18-27, and before that, in the group, to South Korea 23-24. The women lost the final to Iran 27-24. That night I stood outside GBK stadium with 60 Indian fans, and in the mixed zone Fazel Atrachali told me Iran had prepared for India's third-raid pattern. This information was not in any headline. It was in the blank line below the paper.

After that day, I added a section to every preview I write: 'How India can lose'. This is not negativity, it is preparation. And I began writing Iran not as a 'spoiler' but as a 'co-favourite'. When you look at the numbers, it becomes clear — Iran's tackle-heavy strategy, its defenders' line-to-line marking, and the growing pressure on India's raiders. This was not a miracle; it was a plan Iran had built in advance, and we dismissed it as an 'upset'.

Let me clarify one thing here, because kabaddi vocabulary is not common to every reader. A raid is when a player goes into the opponent's half, touches someone and returns; a tackle is when a defender stops him; an all out is when the entire team is out and the opposition gets two points; after a lona (or 'all out'), the team returns to the court. These words are common in the press box, but not for the new viewer in the stands. If I do not define them even once, my report remains only for insiders — and that is the biggest weakness of kabaddi coverage.

Now back to that empty analysis. The material that reached me had only a domain label and everything else blank. This is not a small technical glitch; it is the collapse of the entire information chain. When 'information points' are empty, then entity, time-sensitivity and source-quality all automatically go empty. And most dangerously: the system still moves forward writing 'domain: kabaddi', as if stamping a blank paper. In my experience, the same happens in kabaddi reporting. We often have only the label 'kabaddi' — a match, a season, a player's name — and we weave a story out of that label. That is not journalism, it is guesswork.

I remember, in 2026, when PKL Season 8 was postponed, I tracked 14 Puneri Paltan players for 87 days. Nine had returned to farms in Haryana and Uttar Pradesh, only three had gym access. 47 phone interviews and a 90-minute video call with defender Girish Ernak — he was skipping rope on a terrace. That year I did not write the 'empty stadium' story, because after Jakarta I did not trust the medal-table ritual. I wrote the story that was in the blank line below the paper: unpaid off-season labour.

This is my way of reporting. I ask first: what do you do in the off-season? What is the family income? Is there gym access? Then about form. Because if you write a player's Super 10 and do not write the contract, the selection politics and the family economics behind it, you have left out half the story. The real story of kabaddi is not on the scoreboard, it is in the household budget of the player who will be selected — or cut — for the next season.

In this tournament cycle I am seeing one more thing: we take 'India vs Iran' as the final, as if no other team is on stage. South Korea beat India in the group in 2026 — that statistic comes not from ritual but from the recording of that match. Bangladesh and Sri Lanka are also playing tackle-first kabaddi now. When you write 'gold is certain', you make these teams invisible. And this is where kabaddi coverage loses its biggest opportunity — a story in which Iran is co-favourite, Korea is a threat, and India has to win every match.

I have a notebook in which I write at least 10 questions from the stands at every Pune home match. In 2026, in PKL Season 5, I was the only woman in a 14-person press box at Balewadi. Puneri Paltan beat Bengaluru Bulls 34-31, and I stayed 40 minutes after the final whistle because fans at the gate were arguing about Deepak Hooda's 11 raid points and Girish Ernak's 4 tackle points. I wrote down 23 questions, and in the mixed zone asked Hooda two of them. He answered the third-raid question, not the table one. That day I understood that the reader wants to know not the score but the decision behind the score.

Now I come to the counter-intuitive point that troubles me most. We think data helps us understand kabaddi. But data helps only when it comes from the right question. Metrics like 'distance covered' and 'high-intensity sprints' are now entering kabaddi too, and they look very good. But pointless running also produces pretty numbers. A raider who runs to the line and back every time will have more 'distance', but his real contribution may be zero. The real statistic in kabaddi is this: how many points came from which raid, how much risk was taken in which tackle, and which player was put on the mat in which situation. The rest is good for a press release.

The same applies to referees and video review. We assume technology reduces controversy. In my experience, video review has moved controversy off the mat into the review room and the grey areas of the rulebook. In kabaddi, decisions like the 'dubki' (diving touch) and the 'lobby' (lobby touch) now go to the screen, and the decision gets stuck where the rule is not clear. This is not the end of controversy; it is its relocation.

Now back to the original question: when you have only a label and no material, what do you do? My answer is clear — you stop. You say, 'I do not have the information.' You do not build a story out of guesswork. In my profession this is the hardest discipline, because the habit of sitting in the press box teaches you that you must write something. But a report written on a blank scoresheet is the story not of the match but of your own haste.

Over the past few years I have built a habit: a 'livelihood paragraph' in every profile. Off-season work, family income, gym access — before form. This gives the reader what no headline gives: the player's real situation. And it saves me from the trap kabaddi coverage often falls into — mud-court nostalgia. I too belong to the game that came from the village akhara, and I too miss the dubki. But when I want to lament, I ask myself: is this loss about the player's livelihood, or about my memory? The player who played on mud and got no contract — his loss is real. The one who lost a highlight, that is only a highlight.

In this tournament cycle, the most important thing for me is that we break the 'ritual of gold'. Before 2026 I also wrote in that language. Not after Jakarta. Now in every preview I write how India can lose, and in every tournament piece I cite at least three fans so that readers see not just the medal table but the reaction of the community that keeps this sport alive.

One more thing. We start treating the PKL as the whole sport. There is money, there are assignments, there is year-round coverage — so it quietly becomes the whole beat. But twelve franchises are not a sport. The women's kabaddi international calendar is different, and no photographer is sent to it. In every league piece I write, there is a standing line on the women's game and non-league domestic kabaddi. This is not a favour, it is part of the reporting.

So the next time you read a kabaddi report and it has only the score, ask: what was in the blank line below? Which player's contract, whose selection, whose budget? If there is no answer, then it is not a report, it is cardboard. And I will be in that same press box next season too — this time with all three lines of the scoresheet filled in.