Northeast ‘Play at Home’ online carrom tournament concludes

- ADVERTISEMENT -

The North Eastern United States Carrom Association Finals played over several days ending Oct. 17, 2020,  had a winner for its unique ‘Play at Home’ Online Tournament between Louie Fernandes of Canada and Suan Khuptong of USA. 54 Participants took part in the event spanning 2 weeks ( Oct 5th to Oct 17th ).

The Winner of October 2020 NEUSCA ‘Play at home’ Online Tournament is Louie Fernandes from Canada and the Runners up is Suan Khupton of USA.

The score in the Finals at end of play was 20-47, 20(7,5,4,4) by Louie Fernandes and 47(7,10,17,13) by Suan Khuptong.

The  player with lower score is the winner. Score count is by number of strokes missed pocketing a coin.

Players played on their Carrom board from their respective homes on Facebook Live which was telecast on ITV Gold Television channel, Zoom and Audio Commentary during the match for viewers across North America, family, friends and special guests from the Carrom world.

Both Players progressed to the Finals through the different stages, from initial ranking round where players played 3 sets each to League Round Robin round where players played Five sets each, to Quarters where players played 3 sets again with selective opponents, to Semi Finals which was league Round Robin between all players, and eventually the Finals which was one set each, consisting of 4 boards.

The Highlights of event in terms of slams, (a Slam could be a White Slam(WS) or a Black slam(BS) or a combo of both White slam and Black slam which is called an Ultimate Slam(US)) were:

A total of 19 Slams were hit, out of which there were 2 Ultimate Slams (19 coins without a missing a turn), 5 White Slams ( 9 white coins with queen and cover ) and 11 Black Slams ( 9 Black Coins with queen and cover).

Louie Fernandes scored Both the Ultimate slams and 4 White Slams and 5 Black slams, totaling 11 slams in all.

Khuptong scored a White and a Black Slam.

Dr. Shivaram has scored 2 black slams, while Wajahat, Shibu Jose and Ahmer Ahmar scored One black slam each.

Based on ranking, they were put in 3 different groups A(rank 1-15), B(rank 16-30), C(rank 31-54) with A being the champions Group.

A total of 460 Sets were played, each set is either equal to 4 or 5 boards depending on the event stage, totalling to 1,880 boards, player to pocket 19 coins per board which means in all 35,720 coins were pocketed during the whole event.

Group A Winner is Louie Fernandes(Canada) defeated Suan Khuptong(USA) 20-47

Third position play was won by Shibu Jose(USA) defeating Ajay Arora(USA) 28-34

Group B Winner is Suvarna Avadoota(USA) who defeated Tejasvi Duduka(USA) – Scores 27-28

Group C Winner Wajahat (Canada )defeated Karthik Mohan (USA) – Scores 30-42

Another highlight was the event’s first stroke which was by Narayanan Mudaliar.

A memorable moment in the tournament was during the match between Bala Parathasarathy and Louie Fernandes during the 4th board of the Quarter finals, when Louie chasing Bala’s score of 20, was 23 at the end of 3rd board, his last board, and he needed a black slam to tie, a white slam to win. Instead he scored an Ultimate Slam to gain 10 bonus points and a win over Bala! That knocked out Bala from the tournament and gave Shibu Jose a spot in Semi.

The Ultimate slam is 10 bonus points, White slam is 5 bonus points and Black slam is 3.

In the Group B Finals, Suvarna won by 1 stroke in the dying moments of the 4th board, chasing Tejasvi’s 28 points. Well placed at the end of 3rd board, Suvarna was missing many coins as she felt the pressure, but finally used her experience to win by a stroke.

In Group C , Wajahat  had lost to Karthik by a stroke in the semi final, but came back in finals with a Black Slam to seal the match. Karthik playing in his first major tournament, showed great temperament and has a bright future in carrom.

Sachin Kolte also of Group C came with his best with a score of 29 in the Semi Final though that was not enough to get him a spot in finals.

The event was organized by NEUSCA for the third year in succession and for the first time Online because of the Covid pandemic.

Organizers gave special thanks in the press release, to Sponsors of the event Karim Rayani, Mohammed Masood, Prabhu Raj, Pariwaar Delights Restaurant and for the Media Partners, ITV Gold Parikh Worldwide Media. Special thanks were given to the Chief Guest for the Finals, Oscar Phillips USCA secretary, and to Shakeel Baig, president of NEUSCA, Arshad, secretary of NEUSCA and Sandeep Dusa, who provided the technical support.

The Review panel consisted of Atul Bhave, Vishal Karangutkar, and Sridhar Gallipeli The Verification Team comprised of players ( Suvarna, Tejasvi, Narayan Mudaliar, Viral Parmar,Chakri, Sandeep Dosa, Shakeel Baig, Arshad, Ajya Arora and Prabhu Raj). Laxminarayanapuram Subramanian gave the running commentary for the Finals match.

Prizes and Trophies will be mailed to all winners by mail.