Carrom Canada players are all set for the US Open Carrom spectacular, which will commence on the 18th of Sep 2015 at the Holiday Inn. Players from Europe and Canada along with US counterparts from more than 10 states have gathered in Richardson, Dallas to participate in the biggest prize money generated tournament in the world, conducted by the US Carrom Association.
CARROM
EXTRAVAGANZA
IN DALLAS
Since Jayadev Suryadevara have taken for the reigns of US Carrom, he, Aditya Chavali and his committee has made waves in moving the promotion of Carrom in US to a new level in a few months. Kudos to Jayadev and his hardworking team for a great job. Big thanks to all the sponsors, who have stepped forward in promoting this sport.
The doubles tournament strikes of today with over 40 entries. The singles competition begins next with a record number of over 100 entries. The prize money of over $12,000 is at stake and one can expect lots of action, upsets and a display of sporting gestures by the ardent carom lovers.
In the doubles competition Carrom Canada is pitching in with 5 entries: Francis D’Costa & Anurag Chanda, Shad Ahmed & Elango Velusamy, Derrick Silveira & Balachandran Dandapani, Dinesh Shetty & Derek D’Souza, and Madhukar Kelkar & Thomas Lawrence.
The best results Carrom Canada had in the past is when Francis paired with Moaz Shaikh couple of years ago and won the doubles. Derrick and Balachandran came in 3rd, Moaz and Wajahat Mohammed came in 4th, Louis Fernandes and Francis finished group B winners twice and Francis and Wajahat once.
This year the event is very competitive and in this game of nerves any result is possible. In Vishal Karangutkar, Shridhar Giapelli, Shekar Challa, Louis, Saravanan Chandrababu, Fabian Pereira, Dr. Shivaram Gowdagere, we have great doubles players, and they could pick up the doubles crown.
The singles event will see the evergreen and unbeatable 8 times champion Saravanan, European runner up Fabian, former champions, Vishal Karangutkar, Sekhar Challa, Shridhar Galipelli, the comeback king Ram Gopal, the veteran carrom wizard and coach, Dr. Neeraj Sampathy from India, Canadians, Louis and Francis who have been pipped to the runner-up before position, especially Louis with his glamorous showing at the International competition picking up a game from the world champion Yogesh of India, Dr. Shivaram, who finished 6th in the Champion of Champion trophy in India, Wajahat, who finished 3rd and Jayadev, the US team member who always performed well in past tournaments.
We cannot write off, Nazrul Islam (UK), Bolin (Switzerland), Umair Muzzafar, Manuel Coelho and Moaz from Canada, Shibu Jose, Murali Balasubramanyam and Dr. Prakash Kagal from Texas, Mouraly Venou (France). Carrom Canada’s Elango and Derrick who have recently won singles tournaments, Anurag, Shad and Dinesh who have shown tremendous improvement with quite a few slams recently. However, the tournament will be missing out on the glamorous Maria Irudayam’s withdrawal from the event. Maria who is 9 times Indian Champion and world champion, would have been a treat to watch. The tournament has also attracted the current ICF chief Josef Meyer from Switzerland who will also participate.
With such an array of talent which will be showcased in the next few days, it’s anyone’s guess. Unless, the most statistical and practice oriented Mr. Laxminarayan Subramanian from North Carolina pulls a rabbit from his hat and disappears with the titles!!!
Dallas Open
2015
