“In order to liven up my playing experience - and to stop me immediately going back onto Gamefinder as soon as a match has finished - I've decided to write a report after each game. That way I'll get to remember some classic games, and perhaps remind myself of some not-so-classic ones as well.

This one was great. It's exactly the sort of game I love playing - nice and fast, plenty of scoring, plenty of opportunity to throw some long bombs, and a generally evenly-matched game. I had a 180TV advantage, but Emphasy is a much better player than me so it kind of balanced out.

Fist half: Things didn't go so well for Emphasy thanks to some truly appalling dice. He spilled an easy catch and I was able to go 2-1 up, injuring one of his players along the way (neither of us had any reserves). We traded TDs and then he made a one-turn touchdown to even things up, finally ending the half with a bit of luck as my own one-turn attempt was thwarted by a Perfect D!

Second half: Luck switched - as it often does. My first five turns all ended earlier than I would have liked them to, thanks to my inability to go for it - even with all that sure feet. By the time I finally found Emphasy's endzone, he'd already scored twice so it was now me who had the uphill struggle. I pulled one back with yet another one-turner, but that still left Emphasy with a TD in-hand so there was no need for him to risk any players in a last-turn scoring drive.

Sadly, we both lost excellent players along the way - and in both cases the injuries were self-inflicted. I came off lightly with a niggler to my top scorer, but Emphasy had a superb AG5 MA9 wardancer kill himself - just to make the victory somewhat pyrrhic.

One thing I did like about this game, and it's something I should definitely pay more attention to in future, was to see how a really good coach can play through bad dice. Even when things went wrong for Emphasy, he had always made sure his players were in the right position and the ball was still going to be difficult for me to get hold of. That's why he was still able to score, even after suffering a turnover and then the loss of his guard lineman.

When it came to my turn for the bad dice however, I hadn't done enough to protect the ball before-hand. I left my thrower unprotected and within blitz range of both his wardancers, I relied on a catcher making the gfi rather than keeping him back a bit and giving him some better protection. In the end, these things made all the difference.

Having said all that, I still came away with passing stats of 7 for 67, I skilled up two players and made enough cash to be able to afford a new catcher. It was having fun and learning at the same time (which is exactly what school should be) and it also allowed me to kick off my new match report project.

Lesson of the day: WINNING ISN'T EVERYTHING

(actually, I knew this already. It's been my mantra for well over 1000 games so far.)”