Nereid-fins Bomb (Quite Literally) in Second Straight Shutout

The Mayemi Nereid-fins suffered their second consecutive shutout to open their inaugural season in the Bonehead League, losing 2-0 in a sloppy but explosive game vs. the Blightring Bog Beasts. The Bog Beasts snotling squad got both of their touchdowns from star player Hakflem Skuttlespike, who delighted the crowd with his blazing speed and acrobatic dodges, but the true difference-maker in the game was Bomber Dribblesnot, who helped the Bog Beasts amass 7 combined stuns, KO’s, and injuries on only 13 successful blocks.


Hakflem Skuttlespike scores his first of two TDs on the day, backed by his snotling teammates and suspicious swirls of thick smoke all over the field

“Yeah, I think some of those injuries didn’t exactly come on blocks, and that’s definitely something we’re going to ask the league to look into,” said Nereid-fin Coach Mickon McDenial during the postgame press conference. “It was clear from the first play there were some kind of exploding contraptions flying through the air, taking my players out, but every time I complained to the ref, he said, ‘that’s just snotlings blocking them. The little fellas are hard to see.’ It took him until late in the second half to finally toss Dribblesnot from the game. I kept telling him, ‘Sir, I actually think they’re using bombs. I mean, that goblin they recruited for this game, it’s right in his name.’ And the ref looks at me and says, ‘He just has a runny nose.’”


The goblin referee fails to spot one of several explosions that sent Mayemi players tumbling through the air in the first half. (This scribe is no expert at the highly complex affair of refereeing a blood bowl match, but it appears the problem may have been his eyes—and the fact that he somehow failed to keep them open.)

Blightring got their first TD at the end of the opening half, after a panicked and aggressive blitz into their backfield allowed Skuttlespike to escape into the open field. After receiving the opening kick and handing it to Skuttlespike, the Bog Beasts had settled in on their own half, content to run some clock and toss bombs at the Mayemi defense (or make blocks with hard-to-see snotlings, depending on whose account you believe.)

After watching 2 players get KO’d by bursts of flame and steel shrapnel, McDenial signaled his elves to charge forward. The team’s two side-stepping blitzers, Rahor Mossheart and Jalyn Killyps were able to surround Skuttlespike amid a pocket of snotling blockers, and the rest of the Nereid-fin team closed in, dangerously marking Dribblesnot and the snotlings, as well as the team’s pump wagon and trolls.

“Look, I’m a blood-alytics guy, but maybe I put too much faith in the numbers there,” said McDenial on the questionable decision. He then went on to talk about percentages and predictive models in ways that bored the scribes at the press conference so thoroughly that they fell asleep. They woke with a start though at the end of McDenial’s explanation when he admitted he forgot about the fact that Skuttlespike had two heads and punched the podium, shouting, “so if you want to crown those heads, then crown them!”

Thanks to those pair of heads, as well as a key blitz by snotling Chase Dimth, who vaulted his entire little body at Mossheart’s face to take the elf to the ground, Skuttlespike danced away from the would-be tacklers, escaped the pocket and raced deep into Mayemi territory. After elven catcher Falyn Woodyl tripped over a snotling (turns out they are quite hard to see, after all) trying to blitz Skuttlespike from behind, the Bog Beasts were able to run out the rest of the clock before scoring to go into half time up 1-0.

“It’s clear I’m the best-goodest skaven to ever play this game, as even the great Tarsh Surehands himself was never that quick-fast on the field,” said one of Skuttlespike’s heads after the game before the other head jealously snapped at it. The interview then abruptly ended as Skuttlespike’s heads began hissing and biting each other, arguing over which one was truly the head of the best realm’s blood bowl player.

Despite the fact that Dribblesnot was permitted to come out for the second half, the Nereid-fins still looked to be in good shape to tie the game and potentially go for the win, as the ref would eventually be forced to ban Dribblesnot as well as the team’s pump wagon and fungus flingas. A key positioning mistake, however, derailed that plan when Mayemi set up a solid screen along the sideline with speedster Taryk Hill open deep and Mossheart bringing the ball near midfield.

The problem was that Mossheart got a bit too near midfield and too near his blockers. Dribblesnot easily spotted the mistake and lobbed a bomb amidst the elves, sending all three and the ball flying in a huge ball of fire that finally caught the ref’s attention.


Mayemi blitzer Rahor Mossheart is blasted sky high after he foolishly listens to his coach’s instructions to get a little too close to his blockers and Bomber Dribblesnot

“I know that snotlings do explode from time to time, but when they do it’s an explosion of blood, guts, and bone fragments, not fire,” said the referee after the game. “So, yeah, that one was definitely a bomb.”

With the ball loose in Mayemi territory, Skuttlespike struck quickly, racing forward and scooping it up like a piece of rotting cheese coated in raw sewage. Backed by a cadre of snotling blockers, he then high-stepped his way toward his second TD to establish a firm 2-0 lead for the Bog Beasts.

“Sometimes you just have to doff your cap to the other squad,” said McDenial on the turnover and scoop-and-score. Asked whether his expertise in blood-alytics included statistics on how far away his ball carrier should stay from a bomber, however, McDenial said simply, “no comment.”

With more than half of the second half to play and all the secret weapons now banned from the match, Mayemi still clung to the hopes of a tie as they received the ensuing kick-off. But those hopes slipped away as quickly as a dodging gutter runner, when Skuttlespike and a snotling lineman slipped around three elf blockers and tackled a sprinting Taryk Hyll near the southern sideline.

Hyll, who calls himself “Lord Cheetah” and claims to be the fastest blood bowl player alive, looked shocked to be caught from behind by Skuttlespike, who was clearly the speedier of the two. So it was, Hyll lay on the field in a glum daze a bit longer than usual, giving Dimth time to sneak up to him with an impish gleam in his snotling eyes. Giggling wildly, Dimth stomped on Hyll’s throat with his sharpened cleats, unleashing a geyser of elf blood that spattered most of the first row along the sidelines. As Hyll quickly turned as white as the chalked sidelines, it was clear that Dimth’s boot had found his jugular, and the elven catcher was dead in a matter of minutes.


Taryk “Lord Cheetah” Hyll contemplates whether he may not be as fast as he thought he was as Chase Dimth tiptoes up behind him, his little snotling head filled with bad intentions

As Dimth and Skuttlespike pointed and laughed at the dying elf, this finally gave the Nereid-fins a chance to get their hands on the rat. Killyps and elven lineman Kadyr Kohoo delivered simultaneous spinning back fists to each of Skuttlespike’s snouts, sending him sprawling into the crowd. Rather than throttle the rat, the crowd—who’d been thrilled by his performance thus far—hoisted him on their shoulders, and allowed him to toss the ball back onto the pitch. Naturally, Skuttlespike heaved it as far as he could deep into Mayemi territory, all but sealing the game with only two minutes left to play.

Though The Nereid-fins still had a good opportunity to retrieve the ball and make a pass up field to at least score their first TD of the season, it was not meant to be. In a rather un-elflike series of blunders, line-elf Durym Smythyl fumbled the hand-off to Killyps, who then clumsily kicked the ball around the pitch as he leaned down to pick it up. Snotling lineman Aliya Britney then showed the elves how it was done, easily snatching the ball from the grass and heaving a one in a million and lucky perfect pass to Jaxson Tyjen, who stood all alone in the end zone. Tyjen, however, could not pull off his own elf impression and had the ball slip through his hands a smash into his oversized nose as the clock expired.

In a somber mood after the second straight loss and the death of one of his most promising players, McDenial offered a heartfelt tribute to Hyll during the postgame press conference, praising the elf’s legendary (though perhaps slightly exaggerated) speed. “Considering that this was only his second game, it’s fitting that Taryk died the way he played,” said the coach, as he choked back tears. “Fast.”