TCC traveled to Charlotte to play the second game of its 2004 season which turned out to be one of its closest games in recent times. The team left the RTP area pretty early and a couple of TCCians had even traveled to Charlotte the previous day itself. The drive to Charlotte must have been pretty jovial, 'cause most of the TCCians were grinning when they stepped out of Samir's van. All except Sundax whose complexion was comparable to a tomato (his generous waistline made it all the more realistic). Sundax, who was appointed as the TCC Game Manager for this match, apparently was the brunt of a few jokes.

The SCCA team was there at the ground, and TCC would like to thank them for being splendid hosts and a sporting team during the close match. This was TCC's first visit to the "CCG" (Cathedral Cricket Ground) and SCCA seem to have beautiful cricketing venue in the works with a lot of support from the local community. The pitch and outfield were a bit uneven and bumpy, but it should get better with time. The umpires from CoCC handled the game with a very serious attitude that rivaled the toughest of Bollywood's villains.

The game started around 10:30am with TCC's captain, Ravi Renga winning the toss (1-1 for the season) and electing to strike. TCC opened with Ravi and Charan Gowda and both seemed in fine nick right away handling the opening overs from SCCA's Glen Austrie and Ejaz Awan. Ejaz conceded a few extras but troubled both openers with the odd ball. In the 3rd over, Glen got a ball to kick up sharply and snick Ravi's gloves on the way to the SCCA keeper Anand Kangala (1-22,2.5). Samir Tikare, TCC's 3rd bat, then along with Charan built the TCC innings and both of them played some beautiful shots all around the wicket. The SCCA middle over bowlers- Shahji Fazal, Blessington Bethala and Zeeshan Rizvi bowled excellently in spells. The scoreboard seemed to be doing a see-saw, quiet for a while and then a deluge of runs. Zeeshan, the pick of the SCCA bowlers on the day (6-0-47-4), struck after the first drinks break, by having Charan caught by Santosh at deep square leg on a mistimed pull (2-83,13.2). TCC's 4th bat, Shibu Vachery did not last long, being caught down the leg side (3-107,17.1). Shibu was pretty unhappy with the decision as he believed his bat was nowhere near the line of the ball. Samir was the next to go after an excellent knock of 61 (in 58 balls), getting a quickish Zeeshan delivery that nicked the gloves on the way to the keeper (4-129,19.6). In the last 10 overs, TCC never really got a slog going, but still put on 76 runs, a large chunk of the it coming from the blade of Vijay Jagga (42*) while losing the wickets of Aravind Narayanan, Sundar Narasimhan and Rajesh Uppalapati in the bargain. The TCC innings closed at 205/7 in 30 overs.

The Teams took a 30 min break for lunch during which the SCCA supporters got a barbeque going and invited the TCCians to join them. TCC's Vijay gladly accepted SCCA's invitation after the TCC Subway lunch 'bag' was waylaid and a 6" sub, Vijay’s share, went missing. TCC will be forming a KFC (Kisne Food Churiya) Committee to investigate the matter!

TCC started their defense with Aravind and Padmmanab Damodra sharing the new ball against the SCCA openers- Zeeshan and Blessington. Both bowlers troubled the batsman occasionally but conceded too many extras allowing the SCCA batsman to not have to worry about the run rate. Sundar, the first change for TCC finally got the breakthrough, enticing Zeeshan into a shot, which he mistimed into the reliable hands of Ravi at mid-wicket (1-43,6.4). Sundar struck again in the 11th over, trapping Blessington leg before (2-57,10.2). Blessington was "mildly" unhappy with the decision and exchanged a few "polite" words with the umpire before walking off. With the openers back in the pavilion, the SCCA 3rd and 4th bats- Sanjay Patel and Ejaz Awan worked on consolidating the innings. TCC's middle over bowlers, Nataraja Thupanna and Dhanraj "Striker" Uchil along kept things a lil' tight, slowly turning the battle for the run rate into TCC's favor. The 18th over saw TCC start nailing up the SCCA coffin. The first nail was the wicket of Sanjay, who was stumped by the TCC keeper- Samir in a brilliant piece of work behind the stumps of the bowling of Nataraja (3-108,17.5). The next nail was the loss of Ejaz, who was bowled by Uchil (4-112,18.5). The new bat Shahji went for a huge flick of the second ball he faced and ball skied taking a leading edge. To everyone in the CCG "pavilion" it seemed like the ball would land in no man's land and were shouting as such, till they heard the "war cry" of Rajesh- fielding at long on and running like his pants were on fire! Rajesh covered about 40 meters and made a spectacular running catch at knee height that left everyone agape; and TCC had struck another nail into the SCCA coffin with Nataraja being the bowler again (5-113,19.4).

The loss of that wicket brought Glen to the crease and the bottom of the coffin TCC was putting together fell out. Glen hit 48 runs in 15 balls with 5 huge sixes and TCC found themselves facing the gun. The unlucky bowlers to the take the stick were Aravind and Uchil, both of whom had earned the "Striker" rating from TCC's captain in the recent past. But after the mauling that was handed down, both the “Strikers” will probably travel in the baggage car for a while. Vijay then pulled one back for TCC, by having Glen bowled with a express Yorker length delivery (6-178,24.5). Two balls and two runs later, Santosh G, who had patiently supported and viewed Glen’s fireworks from the other end, fell leg before to Nataraja (7-180,25.1). The next SCCA bat- Rizwan Ayub also lasted all of two balls, going for a wild heave, giving Samir a skier and TCC were ready pull a rabbit of their hats (8-181,25.3). Instead of a rabbit, TCC found a rock in SCCA’s Anand, who had arrived at the wicket at the fall of Santosh’s wicket and played a patient knock, playing out the good balls and scoring off the bad ones. TCC struck again through a brilliant piece of field placing from Aravind who moved Sundax into a deep cover position and Sudhir, SCCA’s 10th bat hit the ball directly into Sundax’s midsection who gladly accepted using his “award-winning” safe hands (9-201,28.5). With 4 runs separating victory and defeat, the TCC bowling choked and let a couple of wides, giving the game on platter to the SCCA team with Anand and Sanoj Shivshankar reaching the target with 5 balls to spare.