Fumbling
one’s balls… A report for Spike Magazine
Evening
Violent Sport loving fans…
New Year’s
Eve Eve saw the Coach Stevie Fase’s ‘Bradfurd Bulls’ travel for a ‘friendly’
(only 3 players died – but more of that later) pre-season game at the ‘Park
Beach Pirates’ home away from home (no teams would travel to play in the far
southern lands so they had to make a base in the ‘Top Half’ and ended up in
Ponder’s End - no one is sure who Ponders was, but the place is probably
representative of his end).
 |
| Bradfurd Bulls |
 |
| Park Beach Pirates |
A large
crowd of 18000 citizens gathered at the ‘Beach’ stadium, numbers no doubt
swollen by the post ‘Mid-Winter’ festivities. A Chaos Dwarf team the ‘Bulls’
have been around for a good 15 years and their Head Coach is a veteran, once
even working for the Games Wizards (GW) for a good number of years. In contrast
the Pirates are a new team to the ‘Top Half’ game and are adjusting to the
differences in play style (the ‘Bottom Half’ game played by the Pirates used
rules from around 30 years ago and many teams also play the derivative
‘Dreadball’ code). Their Head Coach Dicky Jonus is used to a faster flowing,
risk driven game – will be interesting to see how this style holds up in the
‘Top Half’.
An unusual
start to the game saw the Pirates win the toss and elect to kick, Jonus was
later to reveal this was in game plan; kick to the dwarfs, hold them and
prevent a touchdown and then hit them with a score in the mid second half
leaving Fase with no time to come back with a touchdown of their own. If this
strategy was to work it needed the Pirates to pressure the ball all the time,
not letting the dwarves build a cage and then release one of their fast moving
centaur. It seemed the crowd were to be a big factor with the mass of home fans
lifting their team from the start.
Kick off roll saw the Pirates gain
an extra re-roll, giving them 4 in total.
A solid
kick off saw the ball sail down the field only for some unusual spin on the
ball to turn it boomerang like and land just inside the Bulls half.
A
special card was played that deviated the landing point 2d6 instead of the
normal one!
It looked
as if the Bulls would be able to quickly form the dreaded cage in an
advantageous position, and that Dicky’s strategy would backfire very quickly.
 |
| Don't worry he needs a 6 to intercept - damn! |
However, a
rookie Bulls lineman fumbled the pick-up and it was quickly pounced on by
‘Yungie’ the Pirates open side Blitzer and handed off to Dunkel the thrower. A
melee quickly developed which enabled Spinee, the Pirates main catcher, to dart
into the Endzone and await for what had to be the first touchdown of the game.
Under pressure as the pocket collapsed around him the Pirate’s thrower cocked
his arm, leaping around the Bull Centaur in front of him and released the ball
in a tight spiral, the crowd roared. But the Bulls had a few tricks down their
pads and the Centaur back kicked a lineman up in into the sky and they plucked
the spiralling ball out of the air for a rare interception.
Finding
themselves, somewhat surprisingly, with the ball and half the half left on the
time candle the Bulls swept right in a loose cage. With most of the Pirates
near to the other touchline the cage had nothing but fresh pitch in front of it.
Again it looked as if the game would get its first Touchdown.
Unbeknown
to Fase though his main Centaur had a slight problem. He had been caught by an
‘imp inconographer’ (operated by Boyesy, the Pirates ‘fixer’) in a rather
compromising position with a number of livestock items in a local club the
night before the game. In order to obtain the original sketches he had been
told that on a signal from the side-line he had to ‘become a pirate’ for a while!
Boysey standing on the side-line shouting, “What a loada bull…” appears to have
been the signal as at that moment the Centaur seemed to ‘bolt’, out of control
(or so it seemed) he back kicked the ball carrier so hard it actually killed
the poor soul and the ball bobbled free. Obviously the crowd erupted at this
point and then Spinee rushed free again
and jumped up and down widely in the Endzone… The crowd roared, all Dunkel had
to do was pick up the ball and throw a short pass to Spinee. Bending over to
scoop the ball up there was no pressure at all on the Pirates’ thrower, his
extra training (sure hands) would help… Wouldn’t it?
Dunkel
scooped the ball up and looked downfield to see his receiver waving in the end
zone still… Again the ball spiralled perfectly down the field. However, just at
that moment it appeared a coin (still in its leather pouch with lots of other
coins) smacked Spinee on the back of the head – just enough to make her juggle
and then drop the pass!
After the
crowd had stopped playing around with the ball it eventually ended up in the
hands of a Bulls’ lineman. But the referee bought an end to a scintillating, if
very low scoring, first half. Jonus’ tactic had worked 50% at least…
A long,
long kick got the second half underway, forcing the Pirates thrower to drop
back deep. However, a nice pocket was set up and a receiver skipped away down
the touch-line. The Bulls dealt out some punishment but the pocket held as
Dunkel (the thrower) moved up into it. Yet again the crowd roared as it seemed
the touch-down pass was all set up. Again they groaned, this time the pass went
astray… And was pounced on deep in their own half by the Bulls. Setting up a
decent cage the dwarves set off up-field, but were undone by a blind side blitz
and then the Pirates blitzer caught the loose ball and headed for the end-zone.
In the furious few minutes that followed though the ball was knocked free and
the Dwarves mounted one last attack, sweeping down their right flank. An
assisted tackle sent the ball flying into the crowd where the Bulls’ fans were!
Doing their best for their team they launched the ball into the Pirates’
end-zone! But alas time was too short for the Bulls to get to it and the last
minutes of the game were a good old punch up in the middle of the pitch!
So folks,
there you have it, hardly the ‘friendly’ it was billed to be with numerous
players KO’d and two Bulls and one Pirate requiring the assistance of an
undertaker. No touch-downs but the crowd were kept well entertained throughout
with a number of near, near misses. All we can say is that if this is a sign of
things to come, then the season ahead is going to be awesome, absolutely
awesome…
MVP went to Katrina the Ogre whose first game saw her putting numerous big hits in, killing two opposing line men and opening many a gap! See Spike Magazine for her profile....http://rollingcrits.blogspot.co.uk/2016/12/blood-bowl-player-profile.html
Here are some random pictures sketched by the crowd of the action:
No comments:
Post a Comment