second chances
a documentary series
DAN WATERS
STARTING QUARTERBACK
"Bet ya'll were expecting something mad, like a 50-0 blowout of TJUN-ia, since we were talking about them so much in the previous part, huh? Ooh, it's a rematch, they're probably overaroused because every time they lose they seem to lose their collective minds, eh? Well. About that."
HANS KWAITKOWSKI
STARTING CORNERBACK
"To put things nicely, we got pump—"
DAN WATERS
STARTING QUARTERBACK
"—PSYCH! We lost. Smashed. Utterly broken. Played terribly, played like chumps, went 20-7. Yeah, I figure I'd rip off that bandaid before we all collectively got a bit too misty-eyed, a bit self-congratulatory, a bit...well, we really shouldn't dwell on it either. Our hotel got discovered, they made noise outside it all night..."
NICK EVANS
STARTING KICKER
"Okay, Dan talks a lot of shit all the time, but he's right on this one. We lost, yeah. We were too chill about the match — after all, we'd just qualified. Several of us woke up with barely four hours of sleep. Those fans, they can be passionate."
TYLER DAVIS
STARTING HALFBACK
"More than can possibly be said for our own countrymen. We'd qualified for the playoffs, but after losing to Ranoria, it seemed like attention was focusing back on the other type of football. Didn't help that there was an actual title fight that year, too."
FRANCIS MARR
STARTING WIDE RECEIVER
"But we pressed on. Coach didn't make too much light of that match. As I think some of us mentioned, after we'd qualified for the playoffs he rather looked like he had a weight taken off his shoulders. None of us knew why, of course. None of us still do. None of the 53 of us, not Harry, not Simon, not Andrea. It's all been wild guesses since —"
DAN WATERS
STARTING QUARTERBACK
"Skipping ahead, people, skipping ahead. We've got more games to cover — well, just one, really, but this one really does deserve its own play-by-play for just how goddamn good it is."
TYLER DAVIS
STARTING HALFBACK
"Talk about not getting too misty-eyed."
DAN WATERS
STARTING QUARTERBACK
"Hey, y'know what? We're all entitled to this.
We did this, together, as a team. I think we earned the right to get misty-eyed about this one match."
TYLER DAVIS
STARTING HALFBACK
"I guess you're right."
Despite reports of coach Charlie Brown being satisfied with his team's performance following a disappointing 20-7 loss to TJUN-ia, the mood in the Tumbran camp was relatively low following the defeat and travel back to Tumbra. The whole process of qualifying for the World Bowl, spread over four months, saw a short break — of about few weeks — before the final group stage match before Ranoria. Back at home base in Gamaliel, the team carefully weighed up their plans for the return match against Ranoria.
RUSSELL DEAN
STARTING TIGHT END
"So we were 5-2 after seven games played. TJUN-ia had finished their schedule, see — they went 5-3. So for us to overtake them, we had to win against Ranoria — already a difficult task — and then we had to win by more than twelve points."
FRANCIS MARR
STARTING WIDE RECEIVER
"Yeah, not the easiest task by any means. They were third in the world, second of the teams participating this edition — we were all ready for another loss, perhaps being consigned to having to play a play-in game before the actual knockouts, yada yada."
HANS KWAITKOWSKI
STARTING CORNERBACK
"Really makes you wonder what was going through their minds. They were 7-0. Easily could've matched Ko-oren. All they had to do was kick us — the literal equivalent of a can on the road — aside."
SEBASTIAN NEUMANN
STARTING CENTER
"But we had one advantage. One. Just one."
DAN WATERS
STARTING QUARTERBACK
"They were coming to us. And we were going to Give. Them. Hell. If they wanted that 8-0, well, they'd need to fight for it."
"Actually, Seb, when you think about it we really had two —"
SEBASTIAN NEUMANN
STARTING CENTER
"Please don't ruin the moment."
DAN WATERS
STARTING QUARTERBACK
"Right. Yeah. And we were going to exploit the hell out that one opportunity we'd get."
"Still wouldn't be easy, though."
SEBASTIAN NEUMANN
STARTING CENTER
"For fuc—"
The Krauts were looking good for going flawless. Only two teams at this point had the possibility of doing that — the Dragonflies of Ko-oren, reigning world champions, World Cup 87 finalists, amongst numerous other accolades. The other were, well, Ranoria. Ever since their near-miss since Tumbra they'd hit back in imperious form — 33-17 against TJUN-ia, 33-13 against Xanneria, and a 39-0 shutout against Arjunnagar. There were rumours that in Ranoria they'd already begun paying out on a Ranoria victory — the only question was how big the winning margin would be.
Tumbra had two advantages heading into the game.
One, they would be playing at home. A twenty-three thousand university stadium wasn't the most intimidating of places, compared to, say, the Henza Center in Chromatika, which seats 66 thousand, the Stadium of the Restoration in Banija, which seats 91 thousand, or even the mighty impressive Karmin-Falce Superdome in Ranoria, which seats a hundred and twenty-one thousand. But it was still home, nonetheless, and the match against Ranoria would see a capacity crowd (and more) fill in the stadium. A last ditch-attempt to move the match to Serrapince Park, which sat seventy-four thousand, failed when the team realised that the pitch was too small for gridiron. That, and the fact that the city of Serrapince would've murdered the Misfits if they tore up the field and caused a loss of momentum. Which, to them, was vitally important, since Serrapince were in their own hunt for the title and, well, the Misfits were playing to not miss out on a better playoff berth.
Football fans can be superstitious as all hell, sometimes.
The second advantage?
Tumbra wrote:HANS KWAITKOWSKI
STARTING CORNERBACK
"Think they were scared shitless of us, for some reason. We were twenty-seventh. They were third [in the world], and had just smashed everyone."
HANS KWAITKOWSKI
STARTING CORNERBACK
"...They were, somehow, still scared of us. They'd
won against us! There was
no reason why they should've been scared of us!"
TED BUTCHER
STARTING MIDDLE LINEBACKER
"There was, actually. Us. If you look at our defensive lineup — Chris (Jowell), Evan (Alvarado), Andrew (Lazenby) and Gary (Watts), there's a good chance I'd be scared, too. Now, they weren't available for this — but you only need to look at game footage to see how menacing they were. Staring the opposite line in the eye. And right behind them? Us. Ling (Tan Linghe), me in the middle, and Marco (Bennett), on the right. I think we, somehow, got to their quarterback, John Garrett, I think it was. I know I did. Stared him straight in the eyes, I did."
"And he stared back like a deer in headlights."
TAN LINGHE (陈灵何)
STARTING LEFT OFFENSIVE LINEBACKER
"We knew — well, I knew, at least, that if we were to shut their offence down, we had to mess up their Tight End. So we did."
Ranoria's offence combined for a combined total of zero touchdowns across the four quarters that night in Readale. With Andrew Lazenby and Ted Butcher marshalling the defence, the most they gave up was a field goal — in itself a victory of their own. John Garrett was far from his usual blazing best in Tumbra, his famed partnership with his tight end Johnny Farmer disappearing up in smoke as the two of them got nowhere.
If Ranorian armchair analysts were up in arms after Garrett's first-quarter interception, they would've been livid at Garrett being sacked. Not just once, but several times. It was a humbling night for the Krauts, but the worst was still to come.
DAN WATERS
STARTING QUARTERBACK
"..."
FRANCIS MARR
STARTING WIDE RECEIVER
"You're not saying anything, Dan."
SEBASTIAN NEUMANN
STARTING CENTER
"That smirk on his face tells us all we need to know. I'll make good use of these rare opportunities where Dan actually bothers to shut up to tell our side of the story. So we attacked second. On their first three downs they made up a total of seventeen yards up the pitch, and their fourth down only went an additional four. When we took the pitch, we knew that we were now really on the cusp of something special."
DAN WATERS
STARTING QUARTERBACK
"They were properly rattled. So it was my time to have fun. Sailed through them like paper. Francis and John ran through their defences. Inch-perfect, on point, great passes every time."
"We were twenty-nil up by half-time."
Team 1Q 2Q
TMB 12 8
RAN 0 0
"Three touchdowns."
(The game footage shows brief cuts of John Soples scoring the first touchdown, while Francis Marr scores the second and third)"One converted two-pointer."
(Russell Dean scoring the two-point conversion)"A rattled opposition."
(John Garrett, looking despondent, hands on his head)"This was our night."
(Dan Waters, flanked by his team, trying to contain himself but with a massive smile on his face as the team walks off at the second quarter)
SEBASTIAN NEUMANN
STARTING CENTER
"...somehow I knew that moment of silence wouldn't last long."
DAN WATERS
STARTING QUARTERBACK
"Third quarter? Another touchdown. Fourth quarter? Another one. We even let Nick out to let him kick the ball, get him in on the action. It took them the best part of an hour of play to notch points up on the board. But we knew they were done."
"We didn't even care too much about the field goal they scored."
"A complete performance, a victory for the ages, one of everyone's very best matches. Readale was loud and proud that night. Twenty-three thousand, my ass. There were at least thirty there that night. And that's not even counting the Ranorians who made the trip from AO."
TED BUTCHER
STARTING MIDDLE LINEBACKER
"I know I did. Could've been a washout. But the moment they elected for the field goal and not the fourth down I knew they just wanted some points on the board."
DAN WATERS
STARTING QUARTERBACK
"And that was it. We'd won. We were 6-2. Second in our group. Won by more than twelve points. We did
everything that we needed to do. We forced our way back into second, though really it made no difference, but it was something to be proud of."
"And that, really, was all that mattered."
HANS KWAITKOWSKI
STARTING CORNERBACK
"We had a few celebrations on campus that night. Well, I say just a few, but —"
DAN WATERS
STARTING QUARTERBACK
"We celebrated like we'd won the whole thing. The whole nine yards and all that. We went crazy."
"I see that look on your face. No, you couldn't say we hadn't earned it. Not every day you go toe-to-toe with the undefeated world n.3 and come out victorious."
"But that wasn't the end of our story. Far from it. Well, maybe closer than the phrasing might suggest, but —"
SEBASTIAN NEUMANN
STARTING CENTER
"Dan, for God's sake, stop ruining the fuc—"
On a warm night in Readale, the Tumbran national gridiron team recorded a win for the ages. A classic underdog story. There were, of course, the usual tropes of it bringing hope, and love, and all that to the team. After all, with the win, they'd gone up to second in the group. Ninth in the overall playoff table.
The beginning of a new age in gridiron, some said. Here was the start of a new era. There were talks of a professional league, everything. This was the win that changed everything. The stuff of legends.
They were right on that bit. This win would go down, in times to come, as a legend, both in Ranoria and Tumbra. But they were so, so wrong about everything else.
Team 1Q 2Q 3Q 4Q Score
TMB 12 8 6 7 33
RAN 0 0 0 3 3