“Grotty Little Tournament XIII: High TV Qualifiers: round 2:

With two very nice cards and a Blitz! on kick-off I believed I had a very decent chance to win, but eventually the dwarfs - with Nuffle on their side - still got the upper hand.

After winning the toss, the dwarfs chose to receive in the first half. But my elves got rewarded with a juicy Blitz! on the kick-off. After half a minute of deliberation, I decided to go all in. I only got a few guys through after spending a reroll on a gfi to mark the runner and failing a dodge on the next elf. But I added the pit trap immediately, to prevent the ST4 blodge runner to advance too much. During my first real turn I got another few guys through, still trying to prevent the ballcarrier from advancing too much.

In turn two I got rewarded by a double skull on the dwarf side, after a greedy reroll on a push. Suddenly I got an opportunity to blitz the ballcarrier. Unfortunately 4d (with tackle) were not enough to take him down. Next turn I got another 2d block (with tackle) on the ball, but it was still not enough.

Then the dwarf grind started and I had to swap from an aggressive to a conservative defense with the 6 players still on the pitch. I still had the greased shoes, which I planned to play in the last turn, but I needed a push that I didn't get (on a -2d blitz), so I kept it for the second half.

In the second half - during which I had to face the deathroller again after a successful argue - I managed to score relatively early in turn 4. I quickly discarded the option to stall, as that would be a recipe for disaster. Still 5 turns of holding back the dwarfs. Luckily I had good ko's and still 9 players available.

The plan was to construct a double defensive line of 4x2 to slow down the advance, but a snaked dodge (taking the player to the ko box as well) decided otherwise. This meant half the dwarfs pushed through, including the ballcarrier. I managed to put up a last defensive line and added the greased shoes dirty trick, making all gfi's 5+ for the turn. Rather than risking the inevitable trip on the beard, the dwarfs decided go for the pass (3+, 3+) for the winning touchdown. And it worked :-(

Beaten by a last turn dwarf pass... not something an elf likes to see...

Well done Emphasy and thanks for the very entertaining game! This could have been a boring match, but it was one of the best I had since many weeks.

May the opposing claws in the final be kind on the dwarf flesh.

”