Unable to establish sql server connection from my rh vm to the windows sql server

Hi team,Good day...
1:I am running rhel7.4 (on a virtual box) and jboss eap7(on the same virtual box) to deploy and test my war.
2:The database is residing in my host machine windows 10.
Databases are 1:oracle and 2:microsoft sql server, both on windows.

3:I have successfully managed to establish connection between the jboss(on the rh vm) and the window oracle db...this is the standalone.xml datasource snippet:

               
                jdbc:oracle:thin:@172.16.9.116:1521:ORCL
                oracle.jdbc.OracleDriver
                oracle
                
                    MEP_DEV_LINUX
                    MEP_DEV_LINUX
                
            

4:Issue!!! : I am failing to establish connection to the ms sql server from the jboss ... i have tried so many combinations and other desperate tweakings to the standalone datasource subsystem configurations but no success.

My sql ds configuration snippet:

            
            jdbc:sqlserver://172.16.9.116:1433/master;databaseName=master;
            
            com.microsoft.sqlserver.jdbc.SQLServerDriver
            mssql
            
                sa
                ridiculus123
            

I am constantly getting this error--->
Caused by: com.microsoft.sqlserver.jdbc.SQLServerException: The TCP/IP connection to the host localhost, port 1433 has failed. Error: "Connection refused. Verify the connection properties. Make sure that an instance of SQL Server is running on the host and accepting TCP/IP connections at the port. Make sure that TCP connections to the port are not blocked by a firewall.".
at com.microsoft.sqlserver.jdbc.SQLServerException.makeFromDriverError(SQLServerException.java:206)
at com.microsoft.sqlserver.jdbc.SQLServerException.ConvertConnectExceptionToSQLServerException(SQLServerException.java:257)
at com.microsoft.sqlserver.jdbc.SocketFinder.findSocket(IOBuffer.java:2385)
at com.microsoft.sqlserver.jdbc.TDSChannel.open(IOBuffer.java:567)
at com.microsoft.sqlserver.jdbc.SQLServerConnection.connectHelper(SQLServerConnection.java:1955)
at com.microsoft.sqlserver.jdbc.SQLServerConnection.login(SQLServerConnection.java:1616)
at com.microsoft.sqlserver.jdbc.SQLServerConnection.connectInternal(SQLServerConnection.java:1447)
at com.microsoft.sqlserver.jdbc.SQLServerConnection.connect(SQLServerConnection.java:788)
at com.microsoft.sqlserver.jdbc.SQLServerDataSource.getConnectionInternal(SQLServerDataSource.java:719)
at com.microsoft.sqlserver.jdbc.SQLServerDataSource.getConnection(SQLServerDataSource.java:79)
at org.jboss.jca.adapters.jdbc.local.LocalManagedConnectionFactory.createLocalManagedConnection(LocalManagedConnectionFactory.java:314)
... 27 more

5: Its very importannt for me to inform that I am not getting any errors while testing the jboss in my windows. its all cool.

Please help guys...on edge here.