“Crown of Sands - Round 3:
A tough game for us - right off the bat, we suffered a KO from a rock. We also failed with our blitz. We set up the position to make sure the opponent's clawpomber could only strike players with fend. Did not matter, blitz - POW - RIP - apoth - RIP. And a 5-skill blocker was no more. Fouls went unnoticed as well and our player quickly were being removed from the pitch. With 4 turns left in the half, Steve was on the goal line with the first key moment of the game arrived:

Opponent summoned a fierce lightning bolt that knocked Steve out. We were surprised because they had no one that could reach the ball (and if the LB had not broken armor, we would have the 2+ surehanded pickup. As it was, we did a simple chainpush to get our bull clear and he ran in and did the 4+ pickup (used up our last RR).

We then had to kick off and it looked very grim as plenty of time remained. We were struggling with our blocks - we tried to nail one of the claw Gimli but failed...then the claw-mb struck back with a 1d block (could have been 2d if they had wanted) - but it was enough to SI one of our legends. They pushed the ball forward, but did not foul Steve, so he did a 2+ dodge and nailed the ballcarrier to make it 1-0 going into the half. However, a simple 2d block by an enemy bull (no damage skills) CAS one of our blodger bulls before the half.

Second half started and we had to field 1 bull, 3 blockers and 7 hobgoblins...our opponent still had every player available...so we were vastly outmatched. We did the typical strategy of working for local numbers and allowing the quick score. We inflicted no damage but did pressure the ball and force the score. The result was 1-1 and we were receiving.

Now we have 1 bull, 3 blockers and 6 hobgoblins to field against the opponent's starting 11 players. Still we felt we could win...but the kickoff was a blitz...and a hobgoblin died to a blitzing blocker. Down 2 players - were were not too happy. We managed to collect the ball and cage at the center. This lead to the next critical two turns of the game:

Our opponent flooded the top of the cage - he had a chance to try to blitz the ball, but passed on it to just blitz the back top corner of the cage. Then run around a lot of players to swamp the top of the cage...but only 1 bull (ST 5 block - but no break tackle) was left downfield. We pushed downfield creating a shell of hobgoblins - and then dodged our ballcarrier away. It was stated we did not fail the important rolls...and this we true - we made the 2+ dodge with RR to get well downfield. We left behind a bull and blocker...instead of disengaging and racing downfield, our opponent went for the blocks - even RRing pushes...but this left nothing to really stop the score. Ultimately he ended up just marking Steve again...so we made the 2+ dodge with RR to walk in for the score and win the game 2-1.

Overall, we got the dice we needed - 3 times Steve dodged away - and he did not snake any of those dodges - that ended up being the difference in a very close game.”