TCC TAPED BALL FALL 2014 – SPARTANS WINNERS, SLCC RUNNERS UP
It was a perfect game of Finals (10/18/2014) to end another highly competitive tournament with 18 participating teams. Spartans won the toss and elected to bat first. Spartans openers Manne (29) and Kaushik (20) gave a great start and added 36 runs in 4 mandatory power play overs. Srini joined Manne and both of them continued the run flow with continued great shots. After Manne got out in an attempt to accelerate, Jeeva and Srini started playing sensibly to rebuild the innings before Jeeva got run out. The score after 10 overs was 80/3. SLCC slowed down the proceedings in the next 10 overs and got wickets at regular intervals. Srini (22), Visu (29) and Venky (9*) from Spartans made useful contributions to take the score to 141/9 in 20 overs. Top bowlers for SLCC were Thusitha and Gihan with each of them picking 2 wickets.

SLCC had a poor start and lost both their openers by the 3rd over due to great bowling by Nattu and Chaitanya. SLCC captain Thilan (30) and Ramesh (20) resurrected SLCC innings after the early loss with shots all around the ground. Thilan got out trying to accelerate. Ramesh was playing sensibly and holding on to one end but the wickets were falling on the other end regularly. Once Ramesh got out, Dushan (37) kept SLCC interested with big shots and support from other players. Nattu took the crucial wicket of Dushan in the 18th over and that sealed the match. In the end SLCC were all out for 127 and lost the game by 14 runs. Nattu from Spartans was declared MVP for picking up the wickets at crucial moment of the game. He was well supported by Aradhya with 3 wickets. The complete match details is available at: http://www.sportstatz.com/ss/web.asp?club=779&mode=100&match=21500
It was a comfortable win for Spartans who won their sixth tournament in six finals. For SLCC it was the 4th loss in 4 finals. The game had high quality umpiring from Rattlers and Houston Arrows.

The game was followed by a well-organized prize distribution ceremony arranged by TCC and attended by number of friends and family members who had come to support the teams. Everyone was honored with the presence of a former India woman player Mrs. Rajeshwari Antani with an illustrious record for India which included representing India in 3 world cups as the chief Guest. The other members were Surya Saladi, founder member and member of Board of Directors, President Nanda Kumar, Vice President Krishna Shikaram, Secretary Nataraja Rao, member of Board of Directors Venky Rao. Jagadish Biradar, organizer of TCC Taped Ball tournament coordinated the presentation ceremony. Mrs Rajeshwari Antani was presented with a plaque by Nanda Kumar for her contribution to cricket in Houston.
Nataraja Rao, the captain of Spartans was presented with the championship trophy and Thilan, the captain of SLCC was presented with the runners up trophy. The players of the winners and runners up received individual trophies. Man of the match for the finals was Nataraja Rao from Spartans for a match winning bowling performance with figures of 4-0-18-4.
Thilan from SLCC won the Best Batsman trophy with 350 runs. Satish Adapa from HJCC won the Best Bowler trophy with a record 28 wickets and Kunal Manocha from Strikers won the best All-Rounder trophy with 212 runs and 14 wickets.

Trophies were also given to the man of the match for Semi Finals and Quarter Finals. Visu from Spartans and Thilan from SLCC were the recipients of the man of the match for Semi Finals. Yesu from HJCC, Krishnan from Grady, Krishna from Spartans and Dushan from SLCC were the recipients of the man of the match for Quarter Finals. Special prizes were given to Wasif Khan from RCC for a century, Sampath from SLCC for a Hattrick and Kunal from Strikers for a Hattrick.