28th December 2007 started off lil differently at our office. We were having our Annual Sports. I know Annual Sports of a company sounds a bit weird, but we have this every year somewhere in last week of December.

We started it at dot 4.45 with housie and as usual my luck did not favor me. I actually don’t remember when the last time I won something in housie.

After that started the main events and TT being the biggest of them all. Almost everybody participated in this (except the gals). First round results came out as expected but Quarter Finals saw some exciting matches and 2 major upsets. Amit and Arindam Da won against Aji and Vivek Sir (Both among the best TT players at our office) respectively. I played against Debasish Da and won quite easily (taking nothing away from deba da, he played well).

In semi finals I met Amit, his confidence was on a high, and after all he has reached this round after a convincing performance against Aji in quarters. I had some early hiccups but was soon in control and reached finals.

As expected the Finals was between Prashanta and me. Frankly I was nervous in the start and loosing first 3 consecutive points in game 1 did not help me. I had to quickly think something fast after all it was the finals. It was then that I changed my strategy and played defensive game (against my character). And won that game 21-16. I continued with the tactics in the second game also, I had won the finals in straight sets. Ah! I had won a TT tournament first time in my life. I remember reaching the finals a couple of time in my school days. But the feeling after the win was different and very special.

Honestly speaking Prashanta is a very good TT player and I have lost TT games against him many times. Winning against him made it even more special.

Here’s the video of the final match.