“Legend SMACK round 2.

Da Rippas got robbed of this one... But OT would have been tough on us, so perhaps it was for the best. Da Boyz brought Ripper, Varag and a wizard, while da Rippas settled for Morg. With all that $$$ against us (200k!), it was going to be tough. Handicaps against were It wasn't me (Kamog) and Knuckledusters.

...But it started well. Da Boyz couldn't break through our defense, and their pressured ball-carrier tripped on a dodge. We failed the pick-up to steal the ball at first, but Da Boyz couldn't get the ball clear anyway and we got it downfield on the second attempt. Da Boyz had another shot at recovering the ball, but fumbled the all-important long pass from TZ. Da Rippas then secured the ball and teased the opposing wizard (wisely held back) for one turn before scoring. In the last turn, Morg was gang-fouled to death but saved by the apo. 1-0 at half-time.

Second half was disastrous. It started with a close to perfect fireball that took down da Rippas' cage. Da Boyz swooped in, recovered the ball and dodged out to safety. Suddenly da Rippas were on defense. And it didn't work very well. Da Boyz made a high risk play that payed off, and da Rippas were unable to counter with anything similar, so Da Boyz easily scored 1-1 with 3 turns to go. Fine, thought coach MadTias, we can score in 3 turns (even without Morg, who was conveniently struck by heat exhaustion). But no. It started raining, and we failed the pick-up. That let da Boyz mark our players. Then the Troll doubleskulled. That cost us the opportunity to score. And finally we failed a GFI. That cost us the 1-2 TD. Drat.

GG Jesperius, OT would probably have been fair, but I'm happy that all my players are still alive so it's ok. :-) GL in the final.”