They were coming…

The North men, they were coming…

Coach BigF woke up in a cold sweat. Disorientated, he ran he his hands across his face, he had dozed off following finalising the preparations. A nightmare of giant, screaming Kislevites, pillaging and rampaging through Middenheim, faded from his conciousness. They were coming…

The assistant GM barged in to his office, long having dispensed with formalities such as knocking.

“Its done manling, just as we discussed. Your Tilean “friends” have set up the flesh houses and the gambling dens, everything is stocked with the best Bretonian brandy, Ochness scotch and Kislev vodka as you requested”.

“What ever happens this weekend, with our cut, you and I are set for life manling. Middenheim will not throw a bigger party, even if Ulric himself climbed the Fauschlag”.

“Our guests…”.

“Sonrises, McCants and Jeffery have had a tour of the “establishments” and are coming here for the pre-game meal and the team will be here within the hour. They are set up in the König der Wölfe overlooking the Great Park and the Bernabau. Only the best for the Praag Grizzlies, as you demanded”.

“They’ll love it, even though, the crowds are already waiting to give them a proper Middenheim welcome!”

Coach BigF hesitated… “Umm, the final matter we discussed… is it… in place?”

“No manling, it is not”.

“But, but, but…”, stammered Coach BigF.

“ENOUGH” roared the assistant GM. “Besides being a criminal waste of Bugaman’s XXXXXX, it was dishonourable and not worthy of us, we are not spiking their ale”.

“They are big bastards…”

“Aye manling, they are”.

“They’ll hurt us…”

“They may, aye”.

“They only lost once all season”.

“True, they have had a fantastic season, and we only won 4 games this season”.

“er, that was season 5”.

“oh yes of course, when we tore it down to rebuild, eight games wasn’t it”.

“No! that was last season, when we made the playoffs for the first time in franchise history”.

“never mind, they must have won more games then us this season, the way you talk about them”.

Coach BigF stopped talking.

“They must be the team caused the most TV loss this season? no? the which team won a franchise record number of games and the second most in the league?”.

Coach BigF started to respond, then smiled at the rhetorical questions.

“Make no mistake manling, the Grizzlies are very dangerous team, many weapons and their coach is tactically superior”.

“But they must respect us, as we respect them. We are KFC champions, something nobody would have forseen, 4 long seasons ago. Ahab caught his whale this season and whilst it may have its revenge next season, that is a problem for another day”.

“Right here, right now, we give it our all and the better team on the day will win and one thing is for sure, we will entertain the crowd, one way or another…”.

There was a knock at the door, at least some of his staff still had manners.

“Sir, Coach Sonrises, McCants and Jeffery are here. As is Herr Graaf, Herr Schiele and Frauline Wendlinger”.

“Good Good, show them to the Wolfsraum, open the 2431 vintage scotch and say we’ll be in a minute.

Coach Bigf went to the decanter and poured two glasses of an Aquitaine red, a congratulations gift from the owners of the Aquitaine Revolutionairres.

“One more thing manling”, the dwarf spoke as they clinked glasses.

“Your entry in the book of grudges, I have removed it, you’ve earned that much with me regardless”. Coach BigF did not know what to say, he was touched, was the dwarf getting soft in his old age? Ha! not likely! Whatever happens he thought, he needed to take pleasure in how far the Classics had come regardless of the outcome of the Superb owl, he might even need to update the team bio at some stage, Ulric forbid!

“MANLING! stop your daydreaming, come we have honoured visitors to show Middenheim hospitality too…”

The North men… they were here…