By Kervyn Dimney
Colorado Cricket League hosts the 2009 Central West Regional Cup Tournament in the picturesque city of Fort Collins, Colorado on Saturday 23-May-2009 and Sunday 24-May-2009 Boltz Junior High and Lincoln Junior High playgrounds. The Central West Regional Cup Tournament is an annual event among the four cricket teams from Colorado, Austin, Dallas and Houston.
This tournament also acts as a launching pad for the regional team that represents Central West in Western Conference and National tournaments. The CW Regional Cup Tournament was last hosted by Colorado in 2005 at Colorado Springs & Longmont.
Cricket in Colorado
Cricket has a long history in the Rocky mountain area. There are accounts of cricket being played since 1869. Colorado School of mines, Golden Colorado, formed their Cricket Team in 1873.
In 1990s cricket blossomed into an organized sport and Colorado Cricket League (CCL) was officially incorporated in the State of Colorado as a nonprofit organization. Today the League boasts of eight cricket clubs, about 300 members, seven cricket grounds and three annual championships (Premier, Twenty20 and Twenty20 Knockouts).
The member clubs span from the northern Colorado town of Fort Collins to the Southern city of Colorado Springs. CCL is a member of Central West Cricket Board along with Leagues from Central Texas (Austin), Houston and North Texas (Dallas).
Game Schedule:
Day 1: - Saturday, May 23rd: 9:30am – 5:20pm, 50 overs
1. NTCA (1) vs CCL (4), Boltz Junior High
2. CTCL (2) Vs HCL (3), Lincoln Junior High
Day 2: - Sunday, May 24th: 9:00am – 4:10pm, 45 overs
1. Winner of NTCA-CCL Vs Winner of CTCL-HCL, Boltz Junior High
2. Loser of NTCA-CCL Vs Loser of CTLC-HCL, Lincoln Junior High
Ground Information:
1. Boltz Junior High School, 720 Boltz Drive, Fort Collins, Colorado
2. Lincoln Junior High School, 1600 Lancer Drive, Fort Collins, Colorado
The Tournament Committee consists of Raymond Mascarenhas - Tournament Director (CCL), and the 4 League Presidents - Gopal Susarla (CCL), Fayyaz Sarwar (HCL), Anwer Shahbuddin (NTCA), Chakri Gottemukkala (CTCL)
The neutral Umpires for these games are Ganesh Sharma (CCL), Nitin Bharadwaj (CCL), Hemant Lalwani and Partha Pattanaik. The Match Match Referees are Max Ali and Mike Riley
CCL nominated Jarrar Jaffari as CCL's Ambassador to the Central West for being instrumental in formalizing CCL's constitution document, co-developed a professional looking web site and for currently managing it, involved in securing new grounds, led CCL with his vision and leadership abilities and for generating sponsorships. CCL recognizes these contributions and wants to honor Jarrar at this event.
CCL is hosting a banquet for the Central West gathering on Saturday, May 23rd at 7:30pm at:
MT Everest Cafe, 1113 W Drake Rd, Fort Collins, CO - (970) 223-8212.
There will be CWBoD vision and future talks, CWBoD ambassador awards and Day1 game awards followed by dinner.
The CCL team is represented by Rohith Ramkumar (captain), Swadeep Pagadala (vice-captain), Aamer Chowdhury, Arun Tholudur, Cecil Sunder, Gopal Susarla, Kervyn Dimney, Kit Dias, Misbah Rehman, Rajesh Mosur, Rajesh Solanki, Randika Fernando, Rupesh Sagar, Vaibhav Madhok.
The NTCA (Dallas) team is represented by Rahul Kukreti(Captain), Orlando Baker, Vivek Inampudi, Jignesh Desai, Asif Mujtaba, Waqar Hussain, Nadeem Haroon, Vinod Shankar, Sudharshan Chavva, Carl Thompson, Ishwar Gill, Shuja Mir, Arun Jasti, Tanveer Asad & Fiasal Akhtar(Manager).
The HCL team is represented by Sushil Nadkarni (Captain), Owen Brown (Vice Captain), Andre Rowe, Bilal Saeed, Charan Gowda, Jaam Niaz Ali, Joel Pamphile, Jermaine Levaine, Majid Rizvi, Mustafa Rafique, Omer Malik, Patrick Winchester, Supratim Srinivasan, Waleed Ahmed, Fayyaz Sarwar (Manager)
The CTCL (Austin) team is represented by Humayun Bashir (Captain), Satish Patil (V Captain), Rohit Chawla, Ruchir Chabbra, Anjan Contractor, Chakri Gottemukkala, Zubair Hussain, Vishwas Iyengar, Guru Krish, Amit Lopez, Rohit Madhok, Nikshep Shetty, Jay Srinivasan, Chetan Vemula.
Reserves: Akbar Lalani, Praveen A, Deepak Kumar, Mohd. Shafi, Nasru, Majad Ahmad, Pratamesh
Please visit http://www.coloradocricket.org/ for more information.