Campionato Esportiva 38 — Everything Thread

[Restresas]

The match between Restresas and Hapilopper can best be described as a war, as many injuries were layed out, many minor, but enough to cause the bench of Restresas to be mostly used. Hapilopper just was having their way with the Squirrels with an insanely aggressive tacking that refs missed all day and the general cockiness of Hapiloppians was not something the Nappers took kindly to.

Yet, they continued to be suffocated by it without raising their tempers, something impressive that the Esportivan community took notice of. The main moment of the match was when, scoring a goal that was ruled offside in the 65th minute, Indiana Pablo made Cutt look silly, on the way to the goal, and Cutt, not taking kindly to the manuvering, tries to go for a drop kick to the face of Pablo, but realizing that his brains might blow out just quickly enough... he doesn't dodge the kick... he catches the foot with one hand. The entire arena was filled with flashbombs, and the main reaction is... "HOLY SHIT". Cutt immediately gets red-carded and for his troubles, alongside a concussion while landing head first. On the other side, Indiana simply walks away, looking like the coolest motherfucker to ever walk the continent. The moment goes viral, but unfortunately, that would be the last good news for Restresas, as Craig Blackwood nails in the dagger late, and Restresas walks away with the worst loss of them all...

There are a ton of Restresian players and fans crying at the end of the match, and who can blame them? They went through a walking hell of a match and they left more battered and bruised than they could imagine. After the emotional last clapout, it's onto the Lockeroom of the Pomeranian Hub, for the last time.

Wesley starts by stating: "Boys... I'm proud of you all for what you did. You played with fire and soul, but our goals were not going in, theirs were. I'm sorry for all the injured players... it was just absolutely brutal."

Almost everyone is having their heads down in tears, as they know that they blew their opportunity, and that the injuries were outside of their control. "Sir..." James Redmond, 35 years old, the oldest player on the team, stated this tragic news: "My... my leg is broken, right to the bone. I checked with the doctors, and it absolutely is the death sentence for my career... I'm sorry coach."

You could hear more tears after that announcement, as Redmond, a legend for Traffic Conesa, was forced to resign due to a tackle landing on his leg cleat first, devastating the atmosphere... "Mi Amigo... Lo siento..." Club teammate Pablo Albu, visibly shaking, told his now former captain.

After the heart dropping announcment, the team hugged it out due to the emotional and physical toll that game and the tournament had on them. Afterwards, the team walked out, to a sea of squirrel fans outside the stadium, and greeted them all with a kind heart and a good attitude, all while knowing that this was the absolute nightmare that they never knew about.

"The atmosphere in Port Doubeia is but a pitch black for Restresians." The channel 1 news reported. "There are many tears shed, as they knew that this was their chance to move to the knockouts, and all that was left is a team filled with sorrow and grief as they had to lick their own wounds far too fast than they could handle... more at 11."

[Kamijiro]

The Nine Seed

We knew the loss to Dod Rava would be a killer for the seeding later on, but sliding all the way down to ninth wasn't exactly something we expected, either. The upshot is that we can point to our three-game win streak as a point of confidence. Our first matchup will be against Slembana, the eight seed. They also finished with three wins and a loss, advancing from Group D as their second-place team. They scored four and conceded four goals through their four games - this game could full well go straight to penalties (both teams play harsh defense). The interesting note is that Slembana came into this tournament as a pot five team and managed to eke their way out of a highly competitive group.

The match will be the main focus of every television set in Kamijiro, as the failure of the national team to advance past Qusmo in the Cup of Harmony looms large in the mind of every fan. Knockout stages have not been kind to the Lightning in the recent past. Will their fortunes change this time? Only time will tell.

Stay tuned!

[Hapilopper]

Pomeranian Hub, Port Pomeranian, Doubeia
Campionato Esportiva 38 Group Match 4: Hapilopper v. Restresas
In most instances, when Hapiloppian teams went up against a team they had never seen before, a team that was making its international debut, they weren’t really sure what kind of team they’d be facing up against. Would it be a team that they could bulldoze? Would it be a team that had potential? Would it be a team that was a hot mess express of a dumpster fire? It took the Haps about five seconds to realize that this team was completely unlike any first-time side they had ever faced. And it took Ernie Stevenson and Thom Perkins about five seconds to realize the same.

There was an intensity that the Haps could detect in their opponents, the Squirrels. It was the kind of intensity they loved. The kind of intensity they thrived on. It was their kind of intensity. It meant this match was going to be more than just a standard-fare game of football - it was going to be a brawl.

If anything, it reminded those that knew of a Hapiloppian team from 14 years before - when a group of misfits from Hapilopper, this stock car racing-loving nation, arrived in the Free Republics for the Baptism of Fire. For many, this team from Restresas reminded the Haps of that team from so many years ago - in all the best ways. They were playing the kind of football Hapiloppians loved - hard-nosed, smashmouth, in-your-face kind of football. The match was physical as all hell. Tempers were getting hot. Players were getting pissed off. And it seemed like there would be a flashpoint sooner or later where everything would bubble over.

Thom watched nervously at the behavior of his boys - behavior that could be classified as “somewhat less than desirable.” There were some tackles that, in another match, would have gotten them carded or sent off. He wasn’t the only one nervous. Hapiloppians everywhere were watching nervously as this team from Restresas became household names in the Dominion almost overnight. People called their friends - many of whom were jaded soccer fans, longing for the Baptism of Fire days, telling them to tune into this pier-six brawl going on in Doubeia.

And it was getting wilder and wilder by the minute. At any minute, so it seemed, one of the Squirrels were going to break through, fire one past Lou Hyde and take an incredible lead. This team was that scary - a first-time squad going up against these Hapiloppians, and a first-time squad that had so much potential.

So damn much potential. So much so that at halftime, the Hapiloppians looked less like a confident team that could put away this group of first-timers and more - oh, so much more - like a group given the slightest of respite from war. Little was said by anyone in the locker room at halftime. Players, looking for some words of encouragement, looked up at Thom and Ernie for guidance, something to help them get going. Ernie nodded at Thom, and Thom said three words that said more than three thousand would have.

“Don’t be Brenecia.”

Brenecia.

Everyone knew what that meant. It meant so much. For it was 14 years ago, the Haps were in that same position that Restresas were in - a team that, on paper, had no right to be competitive, but damn it, they were going to be, come hell or high water. All of those boys trying to get a respite from the brawl on the pitch had been watching 14 years ago that night when Hapilopper beat one of the best teams in the multiverse. For many of them, it was the night they decided they wanted to play football. It was the night this was the thing they wanted to do.

Brenecia was heavy on the mind as the teams came from under the tunnel. It was heavy on Ernie’s mind. He scored three goals that night and scored a contract with a Nepharim side. So did Nathan Ellis. It was the day the Haps arrived on the international stage. As he returned to the field, he looked at some of those kids from Restresas and couldn’t help but imagine that these kids would be playing for glory beyond their wildest imagination before they knew it. Just like he did that night in Brenecia.

Nostalgia, however, was hardly on Rod Cutt’s mind. He was in a pissed off mood. He was pissed off that he and his teammates hadn’t been able to put these sons of bitches away. He was pissed off that these Squirrels were taking the fight to them. And he was about to put some of them away, and maybe for good.

For the first 20 minutes, the tension was building again - and in fact, it was so great, you could feel it. You could breathe in the tension and it would give you goosebumps on your arms, butterflies in your stomach. This was building to something huge. This was building to something that nobody would ever forget. Had to be.

And in the 65th minute, it happened.

It was the moment that Indiana Pablo became a household name in Hapilopper. It was the moment that left Hapiloppians everywhere with their jaws dropped on the floor, muttering to themselves or to anyone watching the match with them. And it wasn’t a goal - but it probably would have been, had he not been offsides.

It pissed off Rod something fierce - and he was already in a nasty mood to begin with. Pablo had figuratively broken Rod’s ankles going for goal and that was enough. Rod got up and started screaming at Pablo.

“You son of a bitch, I’m gonna teach you a lesson, you dumb motherfucker!” Rod shouted as he launched a foot towards Pablo’s face.

And in most instances, Rod would have rearranged Pablo’s face three ways from one. In most instances, Pablo would have been a bloody mess. In most instances, Rod would have demolished his opponent and would have stood over him, cussing him out.

But Pablo caught Rod’s foot with his hand.

One camera caught Rod’s facial expression go from vicious anger to pure fear.

Another caught a massive smile go about Pablo’s face as he caught Rod’s foot.

In an instant, Rod got pushed back and slammed the turf, hitting the back of his head on the surface. The reaction was unbelievable. Even the Hapiloppians couldn’t help it. The roar from the fans in Port Pomeranian was unlike about anything anyone had heard. Rod, dazed on the turf, opened his eyes to see a referee - seemingly the same referee that ejected Huntley McCullough - kneel down and show the red card to him, as he carried a facial expression that indicated that he was thoroughly, massively and completely done with Rod’s shit.

The Haps were down to 10 men. Rod was being treated for a concussion - one that, at least, would take him out for the first knockout round. But the Haps had to make it to that knockout round first. The team realized they’d have to work a little harder. They’d have to battle a little more.

But everyone was still talking about Pablo on Cutt - so much so that it seemed that goal, from Craig Blackwood as the clock read “81:07” - seemed like an anticlimax, an afterthought. And so much so that when the goal was scored, and when the final whistle blew, the reaction from the Haps wasn’t ecstasy or unadulterated joy. It was relief.

Thank God we got out of there.

Holy shit.

Those guys are going to go places.

Restresas. We got to remember that name. They’re going to go places.

[The 14 Stars]

Christian Fourseasons, end of an era

Theme music: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kLnzc-2OqiI


It was here the last group match, there was alot of pressure on this besides the fact that it would be the last ever international match for Christian Fourseasons the veteran who had chosen to retire from the national team.
Sure he loved the national team but he had been in a reserve rol ever since Kai Schulz emerged as a strong striker and youth seemed to have the future these days and in talks with coach Keira Walcott he had explained his wish to quit as he wanted to focus on his league team.
For this match Keira Walcott the had made a special line-up not because she wanted to do it for him but because Keira herself thought it would make him feel better to play together with the old guard he used to play with, only a select few made the usual start.

Line-up against South Newlandia

GK - Emily Davis
LB - Petra Rafaelov
CB - Federico Zaratti
CB - Jade Williams
RB - Grace Edwards
LM - Ozan Karazhan
CM - Joy Sol
RM - Layla Raharinaivo
LW - Joyce Villegas
ST - Christian Fourseasons
RW - Kira Blade

As they were in the changing room and Christian was readying himself for the match someone patted on his shoulder, he looked up and saw Kira Blade stand next to him with a friendly smile as he smiled back to her.
He had been playing together with her in the national team for years, now would be the last time and he would have to give everything he got in order to make them go through the group stage as it was by no means a run race yet and he knew that he today could make the diffrence for his team and he was gonna do just that one last time like he had done years ago.
South Newlandia was an interesting nation full of good players but one they all dreaded was Angela Diaz she was a real danger to anything and anyone and honestly the Starsians would have rather had her on their own team.

As they entered the stadium a gigantic roar could be heard from the crowd and as all names of the starters were announced the entire stadium thundered of cheers when his name was announces, Christian Fourseasons.
Christian had been one of the proposed ''Players of tomorrow'' who they had tried to make superior to the old players however after Christiana Love went haywire with her granted powers and injured half a team during a match this project was cancelled.
Christian however relied on his own skill signed with Mount Olympus and became their striker playing catch up to Maximillian Flare for years before making his first appearance as a starter then leading the team through the tough time they had needed to improve and to get where they are right now with their highest ranking ever.
Christian had seen it all until players younger, faster and better appeared and he entering his 30s no longer could keep the pace with players such as a young Kai Schulz who eventually replaced him as a starter and he was the one sitting on the bench again.
However today he was the starter and the star of the game, no one would take this match from him and he took his place on the field as he waited for the kick-off for the final group match between The 14 Stars, the Wolves and South Newlandia the Elephants.

As the match got underway it quickly appeared the Elephants were quite...Elephant sized in terms of skill the Wolves werent the hunters here they were being hunted and they had to do all they could to hang on.
Pressure left and right, perfect passing between the midfield of the kind they had never seen before, Starsians werent easily impressed by this team really had surprised and impressed them in the early stages of this game but they did a good job of marking the strikers, Federico Zaratti was entasked with 1 on 1 defense to Diaz and he was even allowed to take a yellow if it could prevent a goal from the coach.
Therefore it was also quite obvious that Diaz wouldn't score, but even though she did not score it did not mean the Elephants would not score any goals and halfway through the first half Aadi Seidel was the first one to open the score for South Newlandia, Williams was not covering him enough and he was able to head it past Davis in the 41st minute of the match.
It had been expected but it still felt really painful, especially since they needed a good result to go through and they did get exactly the opposite as half-time came to the match after an intense first half with great football from both sides, both sides had displayed offensive football the Starsians werent all about defending making it also fun to watch for all fans (majority starsians due to our population) who had bought a ticket to these matches as coach Walcott announced substitutions.
Jade Williams was taken off and Freja Olsen was going to replace her in the second half due to poor preformance, secondly it was Ozan Karazhan being taken off and Malin Jansson would be making his debut in his place leaving Lina Hansen out for this match.

Second half was going to start and Kira looked at Christian, she smiled to him and said, ''We're gonna make it friend, youre not done yet!'' and Christian nodded with a smile knowing she was very right there as they would not go down without a fight.
''I promise that i will score Kira.'' he said confident as he left for the field to start the second half with the rest of the team and perhaps for what would be the biggest struggle the Starsians had seen in a very long time.
Thing was in all this time the Starsians had very rarely lost, most of their games if they did worse ended in a draw but a loss was not something they often saw anymore unless they played really strong teams like South Newlandia now, then you could just see that there was still a long way to go from being decent and able to get through the groups, to winning an entire tournament.
In the second half it went pretty much the same as earlier and as the match went on the Elephants became more and more dominating again and despite his best efforts Federico Zaratti had to make a foul on Angela Diaz, he made a dangerous sliding tackle inside the box not aiming for her or anything but he was a little late and very minimal contact between foot and shin allowed Diaz to trip and fall or atleast act like it was a foul and ofcourse the referee was quick to give a yellow to Zaratti and a penalty to South Newlandia.
Diaz was gonna take it, why Diaz? because it was a special match for Diaz playing against the players she knew and the country that had embraced her and brought her to this stage ever since she was a 21 year old rookie striker back from South Newlandia a free agent.
Angela Diaz faced off with Emily Davis, she had never played against Davis because Davis had been playing in Xanneria and Krytenia all her time and as she searched a corner Davis would react and dive.....punch the ball against the post but from the post it went back into the net unlucky enough and South Newlandia scored their second goal of the match.

The Starsians kicked off once again even more demotivated but no the old veterans they ran and ran as if today was their last and you would assume that it would pay off but isntead a stupid mistake by Rafaelov caused another goal scored by Seidel.
Third goal of the game three nil for South Newlandia, they were quickly crushing the Starsian team, at this rate they wouldn't qualify for the next round and the reality started to sink in with the fans as they went silent and the clock ticked down, the match for the South Newlandians was seemingly won and you could see them being a bit more relaxed.
Relaxing is a big mistake against the Starsians though, they are intense high pace players and it was Layla Raharinaivo in the 88th minute who pushed aside on of the Elephant midfielders in a risky move but no whistle and she had possesion, a pass to Joy Sol who had been moving up already followed as Sol also passed by a midfielder giving an aerial pass to Kira Blade who as always had the run down the wing as she had done many times before and again she did not dissapoint taking out one, two, three defenders and everyone expected her to shoot.
Kira though for a second seeing the goalkeeper very focused and strong, she readied herself for a shot and......she faked the shot! she pulled back and a gave a strong pass to the back of the box where Christian Fourseasons came charging in and with a direct shot in the right top corner the South Newlandian goalkeeper had no chance, there was no time to react and great teamwork between the veterans resulted in a goal and not just a goal a beautiful one and the final goal of Christian Fourseasons as an international player.
No one had expected this anymore but this was a popular goal the crowd roared, cheered for him for his goal regardless of being at a loss against an obviously stronger team but they loved their veterans who had built the foundation the current team was building on, without players like Blade and Fourseasons the national team would never have the quality and strength it had today and it showed as the clock ticked down and the final whistle was blown it was over it seemed but they did not care.
In the 91th minute Christian Fourseasons was substituted off as both the South Newlandian and Starsian playes clapped for him for his career, the Starsians because he was a hero and long standing player and the South Newlandians mostly out of respect, respect a man who had played a great final match and even scored a goal against them and the atmosphere between these teams was very friendly, Chloe Simon was replacing Fourseasons for a minute.


As the final whistle was blown the Starsians laid down on the grass tired but satisfied, it had been the toughest match in a long while but they had ran the lungs out of their body and everyone could have seen that.
They had lost but they had shown their ability to bounce back, be upredictable and always trying till the last second and such attitude would draw the attention and respect of the large established teams in the region for sure, to see that they have a new team in their midst with alot of potential to go far and as they waited for the other results also the horrors of the Restresas Hapilopper match came in and as Walcott a coach from an established nation like Sylestone itself was asked about the match this was her comment.

Walcott: ''That is not a football match that is an uncivillized brawl, both sides know very well that such actions have nothing to do with football and i have not seen any video material yet but im disgusted by what i heard so far.
Both teams in that match have shown their worst side to Esportiva injuring eachother, trying to kick someone in their face it has nothing to do with the game we love so much and i hope both teams go back to playing real football rather then some form of rugby or whatever they thought they were doing out there on the football field.''

Kira Blade's reaction: ''I haven't seen anything of it yet but it is awful i can't understand why any player would do such things nor why neither of the two coaches did not intervent and prevented more of that.
When you represent your nation in whatever form in my view you need to present yourself in a way that you want others to know you and your nation and it certainly isn't our battle but our team represents respect, good sportsmanship and good football and tonight we the Starsians and the South Newlandians have brought that to you live.
I wanna thank the South Newlandian team and congratulate my friend Christian Fourseasons on his final match and final goal.''

Christian Fourseasons: ''Im not answering questions about the other game, our captain and our coach have made their comments.....i am honored to have been able to play for this team and help build our team to what it is today, i believe with todays match my dream has been fulfilled and i hope i have been able to carry this team to the knockouts, we are strong and we will be there.
My time is up on this team but the future is bright for our nation and our football team and i will continue a few more years in the league as a regular player and enjoy my late years and i am very grateful i have been able to make this journey.
I wanna give a special word to Christiana Love whose career was stolen by that unfortunate accident, i want her to know that shes always been a great source of inspiration and this goal tonight? the goal is for her and i hope to see her return one day to the football scene.''


Later it would eventually appear to be enough but very narrowly, they would be the literal last qualifier to the knockouts with the worst results among all qualifiers for the next round but they made it and that made Fourseasons happy.
He will remain in the squad this tournament but he is not expected to make another appearance, unless something crazy happens ofcourse.

[TJUN-ia]

The Random Rambles of a Jaguar - Cup of Harmony 88 Edition
with Killian Looker

Welcome back to this Random Ramble. Things were feeling good with the Jagaurs of TJUN-ia. They had just qualified for the knockout stages of CE38 with one game to spare, despite a tough game against Restresas last time out. Everyone knew that there would be a fifth game after this next one...but this next game would be the toughest of them all. No one knew what to expect, and for good reason, but what would happen when this TJUN-ian side played the Esportivan #1?

The Match
The Igloo was set to be red hot as TJUN-ia faced #1 Sylestone in a game of differing ambitions. TJUN-ia wanted to prove a point. The Sentients wanted to be absolutely certain of their progression with us. This was always going to be a nervy one, a team that focuses on attack versus one of the best counter-attacking teams in the multiverse, but this game got off to a very hot start. Stephan Fiedtkou headed home a Mikela Djé-Djé corner after 10 minutes, but our defence fell asleep for a little moment and Brett Sarcav-Jones pounced, finding Charlotte Eastwood for the equaliser in the 23rd minute. That is how this game entered half time but once the second got underway, you could tell things had changed...and in some way. Odysseas Issigonis was brought on to grab some game time and he took that opportunity and ran with it. He scored an absolute banger past Ryan Macleay in the 64th before assisting Dakota Monroe in the 78th...and that was all we needed to do. The job was done. TJUN-ia had beaten the regional #1. A statement, if nothing else.

Reactions
Reactions were obviously jubilant for one of TJUN-ia's best results since the back-to-back CoH exiles and for good reason. This felt like a different team at times and that was certainly a cause for celebration.

Up Next...
But stronger tests are to come. Town Hall Stadium in Queensland will host our Round of 16 tie with Damukuni, who made it through as one of the 4 best 3rd-place teams. We are not, under any circumstances, going to underestimate this team. No way in hell do we stoop that low. This will be a battle against the #17 side in the region...and one we hope we can win.
GO JAGS!

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SCHEDULE (Group E, Doubeia)
MD1: vs Macbon (15) - Pomeranian Hub, Port Pomeranian W 4-1 (1st)
MD2: BYE (2nd)
MD3: vs Hapilopper (26)* - Pomeranian Hub, Port Pomeranian W 3-1 (1st)
*Nathan Ellis Memorial Game
MD4: vs Restresas (UR) - The Igloo, Winterfalls W 2-1 (1st/Q)
MD5: vs Sylestone (1) - The Igloo, Winterfalls W 3-1 (1st/Q/4-0-0/12pts/+8GD)
---------------------------------------------------
Ro16: vs #14 Damukuni (17/C3) - Town Hall Stadium, Queensland

[Damukuni]

We did it. We finally did it.

For the first time, since the twenty-second cycle of this competition, we did it.

I’m equally as shocked as the 23 other people sitting in front of me in this locker room.

I grabbed a couple of the coaching staff and talked to each of my players, starting off with the 11 people that were standing out there as the first whistle blew just three short hours ago. Everyone was equally as surprised.

You don’t expect a country like Damukuni to break through like this. Yeah, there were the times when we were better, 30 years ago (ish). We made the World Cup group stage from qualifying a few times. We beat Semarland.

Maybe a few old geezers are going to yell at me from whatever social media platform is relevant. “Bethie, sweetheart, you haven’t made the World Cup yet in your tenure!” “You’re not ever going to beat anyone in qualifying!” “You’re not even going to win this CE!”

Yeah, yeah, maybe not. At least not this one.

But ever since the union seized control of the national team from the fractured ruins of the miserable dumpster fire of burning blazers and neckties known as the Damukuni Football Association, at least we can have this moment.

No one cheered for us as we walked off the pitch after the match. In fact, it was more of a stunned silence. Gouvanarch was expected to win at least this one, even if they were almost mathematically eliminated as it was.

That silence will linger for a while. But at least we’ll have this stepping stone.

- MaryBeth Jonas, Manager, Damukuni national football team, DFLPA (member DCIO)

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Damukuni Football Association
公式の選手 | Official Roster | Roster Oficial

Nation Name: Damukuni
Trigramme: DKI
Manager: MaryBeth Jonas
Style Mod: +1.5

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NO    POS      NAME                             G     AGE
1     GK       Antonieta Cunha                  F     30
12    GK       Claudia Foster                   F     27
23    GK       Galen Holmwood                   M     28

2     LF       Custodio Fukuzawa                M     24
3     CF       Eunice Sessions                  F     27
4     CF       Constance Barros                 F     32
5     RF       Mathew Jackman                   M     30
13    LF       Baldomero Nielson                M     28
14    CF       Vega Jinks                       F     25
15    CF       Terezinha Summers                F     25
16    RF       Peleg Bass                       M     22

6     LM       Rokuro Derby                     M     28
7     CM       Ibán Costa                       M     26
8     CM       Jaci Harlow                      F     26
9     RM       Lazaros Ogden                    M     27
17    LM       Deforest Akamatsu                M     24
18    CM       Heitor Clayton                   M     25
19    CM       Jerônimo Seaver                  M     26
20    RM       Saoul Underhill                  M     26

10    ST       Sly Yoxall                       F     28
11    ST       Eytan Kipling                    M     27
21    ST       Rae Viteri                       F     25
22    ST       Batyah Domínguez                 F     24

RP Permissions
My opponent, if they RP first, may, from this point forward:
Choose my goalscorers: Yes
Choose scoring events: Yes
Godmod scoring events: No
RP injuries to my players: Yes
Godmod injuries to my players: Do NOT give career-ending injuries or kill players or staff
Hand out Yellow cards to my players: Yes (no more than 3 per game)
Hand out Red cards to my players: Yes (no more than 2 per game)
Godmod Other Events: Not without a TG (but don't expect to be refused)

[Irithoren]

The decision to have 16 teams - out of a field of 30 total - means that even a team that's among the 50% worst has a chance to redeem themselves in the knockouts. That leads to scrubs like Tumbra (2 wins, 2 losses) or Sylestone (2 wins, 2 losses, negative GD, third place in the group) being allowed a second, nay, third chance, where they're inevitably drawn to the real heavyweights.

The two teams named would be those in first and second in regional rankings, of course. And the Campionato hasn't been kind to most teams at the top of the list: Xanneria (3rd) finished last in their group with two draws, Josifovo (4th) was knocked out as one of the two worst 3rd placed teams. Eighth ranked Lozho were dumped out of the group stage as well, while 10th Hannasea didn't enter - as did 12th Brenecia.

Even without the non-participants, there's going to be a shake-up in Esportiva. With the non-participants, it's going to be even worse. And that's where teams like Irithoren (20th) come in, or South Newlandia (16th), first time participants Osterhalten, returning Hapilopper and Slembana - all of whom are seeded in the Round of 16.

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Start-of-Season Tournaments

   Al-Dhidiyah           Pld    W   D   L    GF   GA   GD   Pts 
 1 El-Akhthar              8    4   3   1    11    7   +4    15
 2 Al-Hudud                8    3   4   1     8    4   +4    13
 3 Al-Shabab               8    3   2   3     8    8    0    11
 4 Al-Ettifaq              8    2   3   3     8    9   −1     9
 5 Al-Amid                 8    1   2   5     5   12   −7     5

   Al-Hurghada           Pld    W   D   L    GF   GA   GD   Pts 
 1 Al-Soqur                8    5   1   2    15    8   +7    16
 2 Al-Burtuqali            8    5   1   2    17   10   +7    16
 3 Al-Nusur                8    3   4   1    12    9   +3    13
 4 Al-Safra                8    1   2   5     5    9   −4     5
 5 Al-Faiha                8    1   2   5    12   25  −13     5

These are full-fledged tournaments, even if some clubs treat them as pre-season affairs (ahem, Al-Ettifaq). The normal football season is only 18 games, so adding 8 more through the start-of-season leagues isn't actually that weird of a system. And the way our ten clubs are divided up makes sense as well: the teams in and around the capital play the Al-Dhidiyah, named after the capital, the city of Dhidiyah, and the remaining clubs play in Al-Hurghada, a name used broadly for the region encompassing anything non-coastal.

You can tell there's a disparity between the two regions from the scores alone. The only club to score more than they've played in Dhidiyah is Al-Akhthar (11 in 8). The only club to score fewer goals than they've played in Al-Hurghada is Al-Safra (5 in 8). Otherwise, every inland team has outscored every capital team, and it's not exactly close. The club to bear the brunt of the abuse is Al-Faiha, conceding 25 in 8 (over 3 goals per game) with such losing scores as 2-5 and 3-6 as the league winds down and there wasn't much for them to play for. El-Akhthar on the other hand, beat Al-Amid 4-1 in their final match to get over a third of their entire production in one game. Anyway, you get it. Dhidiyah football is results-based, Al-Hurghada football is about scoring.

At the end of this, we have the champions of both halves play each other:
El-Akhthar 0–3 Al-Soqur

Which is a resounding win for the heartland. See you for the full league!

---

A small showcase of the other sports that have gotten pretty big in Irithoren: first is baseball, which has seen a lot of attention since the LPB took off not far from our shores. Esportiva is baseball!

* Al-Dawri Al-Irithoreni Likurat El-Bisbul  Pld    W   L 
1 Al-Namothaji                               50   32  18
2 Al-Samawi                                  50   28  22
3 Al-Malaki                                  50   27  23
4 Al-Za'im                                   50   25  25
5 Al-Annabi                                  50   21  29
6 Faris                                      50   17  33

Al-Namothaji and Al-Za'im are from the capital - therefore another title going to the city that according to most has already gotten enough and certainly don't deserve another thing - while Al-Samawi and Al-Malaki are the inland clubs, where the best dirt is from* and where the sport has seen the most growth.

*as they've tried to export to the LPB and other leagues as just better dirt - both for breaking in baseballs and for infields.

* Al-Dawri Al-Irithoreni Likurat El-Sala  Pld    W   L    PF   PA   PD   Pts 
1 Al-Ittihad                               30   23   7  2488 2184 +304    69
2 Al-Khaldiya                              30   20  10  2335 2091 +244    60
3 Al-Ahed                                  30   15  15  2200 2213  −13    45
4 Al-Sinaa                                 30   12  18  2204 2346 −142    36
5 Al-Sha'ab                                30   11  19  2136 2281 −145    33
6 Al-Nasr                                  30    9  21  2191 2439 −248    27

And then there's basketball, more of a student's game at the moment. You guessed it - Al-Ittihad are from Dhidiyah as well, and that's the only club from there in the tournament at all. It's getting a little unfair...

[Tumbra]

Tumbra 0-1 Osterhalten

TMB (4-2-3-1): 1 - V Jones; 18 - M Boullogne (2 - A Renton, 70'), 4 - S Kerr, 14 - Y Lawson, 19 - J McCreary (3 - T Mercurio, 70'); 6 - T Harrison, 8 - V Leighton, 16 - S Harrington (10 - S Monaghan, 78'); 7 - V Wells, 21 - A Pearson (9 - L Crossley, 84'), 22 - E Maddison (11 - C Henshaw, 78')

TMB scorers: Nil

Player of the Match: Cesar Haselhurst [OST]

---

Damukuni 0-3 Tumbra

TMB (4-3-3):1 - V Jones; 2 - A Renton, 4 - S Kerr (20 - B Byrne, 85'), 5 - W Pritchett (24 - H Edwards, 80'), 3 - T Mercurio; 23 - H Hindmarsh (15 - L McCormick, 72'), 25 - R McLaren, 10 - S Monaghan; 7 - V Wells (17 - J Berkenbosch, 80'), 9 - L Crossley, 11 - C Henshaw (26 - J Starling, 85')

TMB scorers: Rachel McLaren (35'), Valerie Wells (39'), Charlotte Henshaw (80')

Player of the Match: Rachel McLaren [TMB]

---

Tumbra 1-0 Gouvanarch

TMB (4-3-3): 1 - V Jones; 18 - M Boullogne (2 - A Renton, 78'), 4 - S Kerr, 20 - B Byrne (24 - H Edwards, 78'), 19 - J McCreary; 15 - L McCormick, 8 - V Leighton (6 - T Harrison, 70'), 25 - R McLaren; 7 - V Wells, 9 - L Crossley (21 - A Pearson, 85'); 22 - E Maddison (11 - C Henshaw, 70')

TMB scorers: Victor Leighton (16')

Player of the Match: Victor Leighton [TMB]

---

Lozho 1-0 Tumbra

TMB (4-3-3): 1 - V Jones; 18 - M Boullogne, 5 - W Pritchett (4 - S Kerr, 69'), 24 - H Edwards, 3 - T Mercurio (19 - J McCreary, 69'); 15 - L McCormick, 8 - V Leighton (6 - T Harrison, 75'), 16 - S Harrington; 7 - V Wells, 21 - A Pearson (9 - L Crossley, 80'); 22 - E Maddison (11 - C Henshaw, 80')

TMB scorers: Nil

Player of the Match: [LZH]

Stuttering group stage performance sets up second potential giant-killing match against eastern neighbours Irithoren

MAIHAMA: Tumbra squeaked through the group stage of the Campionato Esportiva to reach the second round after triumphing in a complicated three-way tie, which saw last edition's fourth-placed team Lozho eliminated on head to head goal results against Damukuni. The tiebreakers were necessary after Lozho recorded a surprise 1-0 win over the Black Eagles in their final game of the group stage, which meant that Tumbra were forced to watch the final day of the group stages from the stands, awaiting their fate. "It's not an ideal format, for sure," said Tumbran national team manager Michael Campbell, "and we'd certainly liked to have avoided having a bye on the final day. But it is what it is."

Results would end up going Tumbra's way, and after seeding, the Black Eagles will meet eastern Esportivan neighbours Irithoren, who lie across the East Tumbran Sea. The homely nation of about 500,000 people has become something of a fixture in Esportivan sport as of late, with regular excursions into the Campionato Esportiva. Should Irithoren beat a stuttering Tumbra, their quarter-final berth will be the best result the country has ever achieved in their relatively short history of participation. Bookmakers are offering more even odds on this match than they would normally; perhaps taking into account Tumbra's dismal group stage performances, and Irithoren's unbeaten record of 3 wins and 1 draw in their group.

The match will see Tumbrans see a familiar face in the form of Ted Bayh, formerly manager of Straton, Lakewood United, and Clyde Park, who is now the manager of the Irithoren national team. Speaking at the pre-match press conference, Campbell said that it was "a great experience" to be going up against a fellow Tumbran manager, given that they "don't really get out of the country much." Tumbra is expected to field a more aggressive line-up, similar to what was played in their 3-0 demolishing of Damukuni, in the hopes that that performance can be repeated. Sports analyst Edward Chadwick, on TBC's Gameweek programme, said that the game was expected to be "somewhat even" — citing that while Tumbra are "on paper, the hot favourites, they've lost a substantial amount of momentum, while Irithoren are full of momentum."

The game is likely to come down to whether Tumbra's preferred strategy of play — scoring one or two goals, then grinding down the game to dust — is able to be played out fully; so far, Osterhalten and Lozho took advantage of Tumbra's proclivity to counterattack against them by stubbornly holding onto possession. "To beat Tumbra, Irithoren's best chance is also to shut the game down," said Chadwick. "If they can do that, then Tumbra will be in trouble."

Centre-right United Party set to rename, rebrand after disappointing election results

STRATON — The centre-right United Party, originally formed as an alliance of four right-leaning parties, is set to rebrand after reports that the brand has "not taken off as well as hoped" amidst disappointing election results in three consecutive elections. Former Prime Minister Lawrence Newell, who currently serves as the Leader of the Opposition, is said to be "in favour" of the proposed rebrand, which would see the party take on the name "People's Party" and adopt a "friendlier" shade of blue for its logo.

The United Party has struggled to gain traction in polls since its 2037 election loss in the House of Representatives to the Labour Party, coming second in this year's presidential election and losing twelve seats in the simultaneous Senate election. An unnamed source in the party said that "the branding is tainted by the disappointing 2037 election campaign, and the colour isn't doing the party many favours either." The teal that the party uses has been described as "ugly," but a short-lived movement to have the party adopt a shade of turquoise instead did not take off amongst parties.

The final nail in the coffin for the name of the party might be the fact that new Electoral Commission rules will come into force when the Northlands gains full parliamentary representation, with parties being founded earlier being prioritised. The Northlands also has a United Party, albeit one that is left-wing and focused on representing indigenous Northlanders; it has been, at times, called the "political wing" of the now-defunct terrorist organisation known as the Five United Clans. The same unnamed source denied that the similarities in the name were the main motivation for the change, but admitted that "it might have factored into the calculations for Newell and co."

Government to commission report into diversifying Tumbran energy supply, increasing energy capacity

STRATON — Newly-appointed Second Minister for Energy and the Environment Senator Jerome Conway will head a commission of experts that will produce a report on the future of Tumbra's energy generation, announced Deputy Prime Minister Sandra Campbell during Tuesday's sitting of the House of Representatives. The former nuclear scientist, who won a Senate seat in Napier in February's Senate election, was quickly elevated to Cabinet rank amidst rumours that the government might start to push for the construction of nuclear reactors to ease concerns about Tumbra's energy generation methods.

"The commission will report on Tumbra's energy supply, potential alternatives — including environmentally sustainable methods of generating energy, which is also a priority of this Government — and issue its eport to the Government in due course," said Campbell on Tuesday. The move is widely expected to try and generate support for nuclear energy as a power source for Tumbran energy needs, which are set to double by 2080. While the report is not expected for almost a year, the incumbent government favouring nuclear energy is said to fall in line with Prime Minister Bertram Andrews' preferred method of "building big, and building bigger" to invest in the Tumbran economy.

[Fhulghamous Peninsula]

The Fhulghamous Peninsula’s campaign to defend the Campionato Esportiva got off to the best possible start that the Colonists and their fans could imagine, with the Fhulghamous trouncing their first opponents of the 38th Campionato Esportiva, Schimata, by a score of 5-0. There had been a worry that the team would not be able to carry forward the momentum that they had gained in the previous Campionato now that many of their key players had retired from international football, but so far, the new boys had shown that they were more than capable of pulling their own weight, evidenced by the fact that four out the Peninsula’s five goals against Schimata were scored by players who weren’t part of the Campionato-winning team two years ago. Things were looking up for the Fhulghamous, and at the moment, things looked like they were set to continue going on this way.

The Fhulghamous expected to have a similarly easy time against Slembana, and indeed they did have an easy time. The Colonists went into this game still high off of their victory against Schimata, and once again they played like they were having fun out there on the pitch. Like Schimata, Slembana gave the Peninsula the freedom to play however they wanted, and they made their opposition chase shadows for practically the entirety of the ninety minutes. The focal points for the boys in grey was once again the partnership of Alibek Sokolov and Cosmas Stamatelopoulos, and there were already a number of commentators and analysts predicting that Stamatelopoulos’s performances in the Campionato Esportiva could pave the way for him becoming a regular starter for his club Locomotive Imgortur in the Fleftic Premier League. Although there was still the unasked question of whether that was because of Cosmas being a great striker in a two-forward formation or if it was more a product of surprisingly good chemistry between him and Sokolov, but for right now, the Fhulghamousians were just here for the ride and enjoying it.

And then it was time for the Fhulghamous to go up against Esportivan Darmen, and while it would probably be too harsh to say that the wheels had finally fallen off, perhaps a more apt descriptor would be to say that the title defense had hit a speed bump. The Fhulghamous and Esportivan Darmen had already met more than a few times in the Campionato, with the Colonists having had the upper hand in the most recent contests, but for some reason this particular EspoDarmen side had a different feel to it. Nobody could put their finger on it, least of all Fhulghamous Peninsula manager Donovan Chase (who was supposed to be one of the men who were actually supposed to know how or why a familiar opponent could suddenly feel so unfamiliar all of a sudden), but everyone in the team had no choice but to play against this EspoDarmen team nonetheless.

It was also in this game against EspoDarmen that the first possible cracks in the relationship between Sokolov and Stamatelopoulos started to show themselves. It seems weird to think about how a striker partnership that begun literally only two games ago could already be on the verge of breaking down, but this was also the first time that the Fhulghamousian national team had experienced some hardship after winning the Esportivan title, and some of the new arrivals were understandably not too keen on that. Cosmas in particular looked to have been quite rattled by this development as he was not used to the opposition maintaining their position and discipline after all the other teams had practically bent themselves to his will. Whereas previously, he and Sokolov were more than happy to share the burden of scoring goals between each other, now Cosmas appeared to be hell-bent on scoring the goal that would break the deadlock between the two teams. It wasn’t too noticeable at first, and there were instances when it could be argued that Cosmas had a better chance of actually scoring as opposed to Sokolov. But as the game went, it was becoming increasingly obvious that Cosmas had taken up the burden of scoring by himself without consultation from the rest of the team. And this was something that was also beginning to get on the nerves of Sokolov, something which could be seen when the Fhulghamousians were setting up for set pieces and their two strikers were having “discussions” on who should get to the ball.

These things hadn’t escaped the attention of the Fhulghamousian captain, Polynikis Kalyftakis. As the new captain of the squad, he was also supposed to be the leader, and his vice-captain was supposed to be following his example. Unfortunately, Polynikis’s vice-captain was none other than Alibek Sokolov, one of the two people now fighting over who should score the goal that would continue the Peninsula’s unbeaten streak in the current Campionato Esportiva. Unfortunately, since Polynikis and Alibek were playing at different ends of the pitch, there was some difficulty in getting his message across. And with only minutes to go before the end of the ninety minutes, there was only one way to fix this, at least in Polynikis’s mind. So when the aforementioned corner kick in which both Sokolov and Cosmas were jawing at each over who should be the target for the taker finally swung into the box, Polynikis took matters into his own hands and smashed his forehead into the ball as hard and fast as he possibly could. Polynikis made sure that the ball would actually find its way into the back of the net before running off towards the corner flag, but it wasn’t really for a goal celebration. Instead, once both Sokolov and Cosmas went up to him, Polynikis took the two of them together and whispered into their ears, “Get your shit together!” before ruffling their hair in a rougher manner than usual.

---

  FHULGHAMOUS PENINSULA 1 - 0 ESPORTIVAN DARMEN  
       KALYFTAKIS (83')

[Sylestone]

“Look, lads, we all know why many of you are here. All of you here, have the ability to be the best footballer in the country. For some of you older lads and lasses, perhaps you already have been. It’s hard to tell, but I know one thing for certain, and that is that I’ve got a squad filled with talent - more than any other nation in Riena or Doubeia right now.

“So why don’t I fucking see it out there? We’ve played four games, and we’ve been playing at fucking fifty percent in each! Sure, Hapilopper played commendably in our opener, in such an important match, we always knew we were going to be tough. TJUN-ia are strong, there’s no doubt about that either, but at the end of the day most of you are World Cup semifinalists! Most of you have third place medals in the World-fucking-Cup and hell, that wasn’t even a whole year ago! Sure, they’re good teams, but they didn’t even make it to the final 32, let alone the final four. We weren’t even able to put the others to the sword as we should have - and have done in the past.

“Sure, some of you weren’t there last year, but I guarantee that each one of you was not far off that cut. Each team we’ve played, each of you are better man-for-man than our opponents. Every. Single. One. Of. Them. I’m at risk of sounding like a cranky sixty-year-old fan here, but you play for some of the biggest clubs in the world. Urrheddiao! Lakewood United! Avondale City! Crossroads! The list goes on! And yet you sit around out there, playing at half your ability, seemingly without a care in the world.

“We came here expecting to blitz the group. Sure, our opponents have all tested us. But they tested us in the World Cup! And we beat pretty damn close to each and every one of them! Not one of these teams are on the same level as the Huayramarca’s, the Delte’s, all of them that we faced. But right from the first whistle, we play like we’re second best! I understand the style I use may feel alien to some of you, but that’s not the problem. You all know how to play the roles I’ve asked you to play. It’s just that none of you are fucking trying.

“I may have upset some of you here today, but it’s the truth, however hard that may be. We scraped through to the knockouts by the skin of our fucking teeth here, and for fuck’s sake we’re better than that! If we don’t pick ourselves up come Dod Rava, we’ll be on the plane home before we step foot on the pitch. We’re better than them, and all of you know that. Fuck, they know that. Everyone knows that! So when we step foot onto Sirotkin Stadium, I want all of you prepared to get out there and put yourselves on the line. You’re representing the hearts, the souls, of thirty million people! We have three days. Find the motivation and when the time comes, go and show them.”

And with that, Mojmir Anac stormed out of the dressing room at their Winterfalls training camp. It was the day after the game against TJUN-ia, and the reality of just how lacklustre their performance had been was only just beginning to hit. The final score was 3-1 to the Jaguars, but it could’ve - and probably should’ve - been more. There was no sense of urgency about the Sentients, and TJUN-ia were all over them. Sure, they’d played well, as they have done all tournament, but the pre-tournament favourites were way off where they should’ve been. Their coach, as usual, was right, and the 26 players in the dressing room knew it. Some had played every game, some hadn’t received a minute of playing time. But was that about to change? Was Mojmir Anac about to unveil the most ungodly, crazy lineup to take on Dod Rava in the round of 16 in a desperate attempt to get the football team he's achieved so much with back on track? Or would he back the best players he had at his disposal - remember, the likes of Holly Statton, Riley Strathfield and Abigail Jones had all been left at home to test out some new blood, although the core of the team that finished third on the world stage last year was sitting in the very same dressing room.

They could play good football. They saw it in Tumbra, at the same time as matchday three was taking place, two weeks ago. In Millsburgh, the Sentients showed exactly what they were capable of in a 2-0 triumph over Group A table-toppers South Newlandia, who were looking like a new team from previous editions, where they’ve frankly struggled in all areas of the pitch. But upon returning to Doubeia, it was all the same old same old. An unconvincing 1-0 win over Macbon, and then the latest result. Something needed to change, and fast.

For a solid two minutes, the Sylestonean squad sat there, refusing to alter their gaze from the tiles in front of them to another pair of eyes. Then, it was captain Hugo Mornington who broke the silence, standing himself up in his corner of the changing room as his teammates took him in, one by one.

“Well, sitting here feeling sorry for ourselves isn’t going to do anything, is it? It’s eleven in the morning, let’s get the fuck out there! I’m sure the staff have plenty planned, and we need to go above and beyond now. No time to fuck around, yeah?

A murmur of agreement echoed around the room. Mornington, however, was less than impressed.

“I said, let’s get the fuck out there!”

All of a sudden, an enthusiastic wave of chatter and clapping filled the room as each member of the team brought themselves to their feet, each wearing a face that could be described as nothing but pure concentration and determination.

The dust had settled. It was time for the Sentients to show up at the Campionato Esportiva in their hard to watch bus-parking, arguably world-class and yet trophyless glory.

It was time to show everyone why they were the team to beat.

---

Starting XI vs Dod Rava @ Sirotkin Stadium, Solvecere, Doubeia

Macleay; Wettenhall - Mornington - Blackall - Molineux; Ryland - Rodway - Lawson - Arnold; Sarcav-Jones; Eastwood

[South Newlandia]

Elephants return to form in Nagato with Diaz back in the lineup

The Elephants were finally back to the same formation that started against Natanians and Nosts. McCoy returned to the lineup to replace Behera, still banned after her second yellow against Riena, and Angela Diaz would start for Donald Baumann. Coach Han Ruoyong had been open about how he would’ve preferred to bring her from the bench, given that she was still not at 100% just yet, but the Elephants still fighting to secure their spot in the knockouts forced him to go all-out for a win against The 14 Stars.

The Pachyderms started well, putting pressure upon the 14 Stars immediately, who were also still fighting for a spot in the final 16. The Blue Wolves, perhaps overly scared of the South Newlandian star they were intimately familiar with, decided to blanket Diaz heavily in the early proceedings. That would open space for the South Newlandian midfield, who peppered the goal of Emily Davis with shots from distance early. Luisa Johnson in particular played her strongest match of the group stage, distributing effectively, and Mary Romero seemed to finally grow into her role as the Elephants’ playmaker, the way Han had envisioned.

The Blue Wolves fought on defense, though, and goalkeeper Davis would keep the game tied on a few important occasions. On the other side, the Wolves struggled to put much pressure on the Ellies, with the defensive line of Vaz-Romero-Harrison looking the best they have in the group stage, and Edward Khan playing another formidable match – clearly still upset about conceding in the previous match, a great mark of shame for goalkeepers playing in Sylestone. Indeed, it was the Starsians who had the first massive chance to get ahead. About half an hour into the match, McCoy got his leg behind a shot from midfielder Hansen, with the ball going out of play for a Starsian corner. Fourseason rose the highest, heading the ball in the opposite direction that goalie Khan was moving, but Matias Vaz was able to clear the ball out of danger from the goal line, thanks to his position on the short post.

Instead, the Elephants used their chance on a counter-attack just before half. The tireless Voigt was pushing the ball down the wing, and while two Starsians converged to take away any angles from Angela Diaz, Aadi Seidel was able to shake loose on the left side. Thanks to this open space, he was able to put the Ellies ahead at the half.

Entering the second half, the Elephants stuck to the 11 that was now on the brink of winning them Group A, while the Blue Wolves made a pair of changes. However, the adjustments of Keira Walcott would quickly be ruined by a second Elephant goal. Taking charge of the action quickly, the Elephants placed the Starsians under pressure. After a double-pass between Voigt and Diaz forced the Wolves into a hasty retreat, Diaz was controlling the ball on the right side of the box. Trying to clear the danger, defender Zaretti instead felled the South Newlandian with a tackle, with the referee immediately awarding the South Newlandians their third penalty in four matches. The previous two, each taken by Voigt, had resulted in Ellie goals. This time, it would be Angela Diaz trying to add to the lead.
What’s the perfect way to kick a penalty? Most strikers will agree that it’s a hard, low shot into one of the corners. While there is less risk than trying to shoot high, there is still the risk of hitting the post, causing the ball to bounce out. Instead, Diaz was able to hit the inside of the post, from where the ball bounced into the net. You really can’t take a better penalty than that.

Time now began to dwindle for the Wolves, who might very well be eliminated with a defeat, depending on results in other fixtures. Forced to make offensive substitutes, and to push up further against the Elephants, the South Newlandian team found themselves with increasingly more space to play, and opportunities to capitalise on Starsian mistakes. One of those, occurring in the 71st minute, would allow the South Newlandians to make it 3-0. Defender Petra Rafaelov played an ill-advised pass that was quickly intercepted by Lange-Parker, giving the Elephants a 3-on-2 towards the Starsian goal. With such an unfavourable numbers situation, the Wolves were unable to prevent the Ellies from capitalising. Davis was forced to abandon her goal to charge Angela Diaz, who was able to keep her head up and find the open Aadi Seidel, who only had to play the ball into the empty net to bag his second goal of the match.

With the pachyderms now content to relax a little bit, and the Starsians still playing for pride, momentum started to shift. With mere minutes left in regulation, captain Blade found that Romero had given Christian Fourseasons too much space in the box. The veteran Starsian, likely on his final appearance in blue, volleyed the ball towards the top corner, where Khan had no chance to prevent the 1-3. While disappointing for the man who had made Sylestone his adoptive home, the goal would not have much of an impact for South Newlandia, who would win Group A anyway. For the Starsians, however, this goal would be far from meaningless.

Meanwhile, the Elephants would get to remain in Riena, which is good news, cutting down on travel time and letting them get home quickly after their inevitable swift exit. The bad news is they’ll be returning to Funami, where they’ve struggled in both of their group matches.

Their opponent will be one of the surprises of the tournament, first-timers Mattheland. The Huskies entered Group B as heavy underdogs, but impressed with a pair of wins against strong teams, defeating Eshialand and Xanneria – name-brand Esportivan football teams that will spend the knockouts on their couch. The Huskies have struggled recently, backing into the Round of 16 with back-to-back defeats. They’ll present a very interesting challenge to the Elephants. The team in orange, managed by Nicolas Pocevicius, is expected to match the Elephants 3-2-3-2 with a 3-4-1-2.

The wings will be crucial in deciding this match, but even more attention will be going to the two goalkeepers. Khan has only conceded twice, and his counter-part, Gostautas Laune, has only conceded four goals, including a clean sheet against Eshialand and only conceding once in a win against the hyper-offensive Xannerian squad. After coming under some fire in the media entering the tournament, Laune has been instrumental in bringing the Huskies to the knockouts.

[Riena]

Campionato Esportiva 38
R16 Results — Doubeia Half

Osterhalten 0-0 Natanians and Nosts
after extra time; 0-0 after normal time; Osterhalten win 3-1 on penalties
Victoria Stadium, Fajar, Doubeia

Dod Rava 0–1 Sylestone
Sirotkin Stadium, Solvecere, Doubeia

Hapilopper 4-3 Kita-Hinode
after extra time; 3-3 after normal time
Pomeranian Hub, Port Pomeranian, Doubeia

TJUN-ia 4–1 Damukuni
Town Hall Stadium, Queensland, Doubeia

---

Campionato Esportiva 38
Quarterfinal Fixtures — Doubeia Half

Osterhalten versus Sylestone
Harriott Loft, Ethelfled, Doubeia

Hapilopper versus TJUN-ia
Stade de Pruxxé, Pruxxé, Doubeia

---

[Doubeia]

Campionato Esportiva 38
R16 Results — Riena Half

Fhulghamous Peninsula 4–1 The 14 Stars
Silver Spirit Dome, Nagato, Riena

Slembana 0–0 Kamijiro
after extra time; 0-0 after normal time; Slembana win 4-2 on penalties
Seaside Field, Anzumori, Riena

Irithoren 0–1 Tumbra
Minami Arch, Maihama, Riena

South Newlandia 1–0 Mattheland
Funami Metropolitan Stadium, Funami, Riena

---

Campionato Esportiva 38
Quarterfinal Fixtures — Riena Half

Fhulghamous Peninsula versus Slembana
Seaside Field, Anzumori, Riena

Tumbra versus South Newlandia
Funami Metropolitan Stadium, Funami, Riena

---

[TJUN-ia]

The Random Rambles of a Jaguar - Cup of Harmony 88 Edition
with Killian Looker

Welcome back to this Random Ramble. 4-0, huh. Four and zero. The Jagaurs of TJUN-ia, despite all the doubts that surrounded them and the co-Managers that lead them, had managed to win their group with only 4 goals conceded and 12 scored. That doesn't sound too bad, doesn't it? Optimism was certainly getting friendly with the TJUN-ian public at this time, but things were far from over. Everyone knew that TJUN-ia had a tendency of flip-flopping between Top 20 calibre and Pot 9 calibre at the worst moments and there were still those who questioned whether they could actually do something in the knockout stage. But as long as we were there, we had a chance...and we were there.

The Match
Town Hall Stadium in Queensland would be the start of whatever was to come, starting with one of the best 3rd place teams in #14 Damukuni. MaryBeth Jonas had a good team under her command, but we had a point to try and prove and we wanted to show that off in this game. Conceding in the 4th minute wasn't part of the plan, a rare error from Ons Moukaddem allowing Sly Yoxall an easy set-up for the opener, but after that embarrassment, we dusted ourselves down and got to work. We acted like a different team after that mistake, trying to corner possession where we could, and that change in tactics led to a far better product on the field. With each passing minute, we gained more and more confidence with the ball...and that would spell the end of Damukuni. Fernandino managed a brace in the 36th and 42nd minutes to take the lead into the break, Kristina Bay headed home the 3rd and Alisha Carlton hammered home the fourth to make sure things kept as they were. 4-1. Just like that. A Statement had been made.

Reactions
Winning by that scoreline, in a round-of-16 game in a major tournament, is something that TJUN-ia isn't really known for. We don't do this shit. The fact we pulled that one off at this very point was one point of rare jubilation for a national team that rarely pulls off moments like these. There was celebration in the air for he first time in a long time, a sense of much-needed national pride after all of this time. Belief was finally back in the game.

But they also knew things were far from over.

Up Next...
The gods of Doubeia have made their decree. TJUN-ia vs Hapilopper should go to a 2nd round. The Haps beat Kita-Hinode in extra time to book this rematch, one in which the stakes can never be clearer.
You don't need to remind me of the events of the Nathan Ellis Memorial Game, the emotion attached to this one from both teams.
A game played in honour of a legend. One in which a man looked like a thug and a woman looked like a Queen.
It made TJUN-ia, for the first time in a long time, pay close attention to one Kristina Bay...and she's ready to go again, no strings attached.
Last time was just for points, this time will be for a spot in a Semifinal and a date with either Osterhalten or Sylestone.
Shit doesn't get any realer than that. This rivalry hasn't had this many stakes outside of NSSCRA. But it will now.
Plans are already in the works for Jaguar Racing merchandise to be brought by our fans, to bring the passion of NSSCRA's rivalry here, and that only goes to show just how serious this is getting.

Last time, it was a day of rememberence that turned into a skirmish.
This time, it's war.
GO JAGS!

---

SCHEDULE (Group E, Doubeia)
MD1: vs Macbon (15) - Pomeranian Hub, Port Pomeranian W 4-1 (1st)
MD2: BYE (2nd)
MD3: vs Hapilopper (26)* - Pomeranian Hub, Port Pomeranian W 3-1 (1st)
*Nathan Ellis Memorial Game
MD4: vs Restresas (UR) - The Igloo, Winterfalls W 2-1 (1st/Q)
MD5: vs Sylestone (1) - The Igloo, Winterfalls W 3-1 (1st/Q/4-0-0/12pts/+8GD)
---------------------------------------------------
Ro16: vs #14 Damukuni (17/C3) - Town Hall Stadium, Queensland W 4-1
QF: vs #7 Hapilopper (26/E2) - Stade de Pruxxé, Pruxxé

[South Newlandia]

Feisty Huskies make trouble, but Elephants prevail

When a new coach comes in for a team, there’s always a very important decision they need to make first – especially when the former team captain has retired, as was the case for the CE38 Elephants.
Han Ruoyang decided to give the armband to goalkeeper Edward Khan, despite how much the defense had struggled in the home campaign two years before. The 31-year-old Avondale City keeper is playing his fifth CE campaign with the Ellies, but the opening match of the Campionato was the first time he ever wore the captain’s armband for South Newlandia.
Of course, having the goalkeeper captaining is nothing new for the Elephants, given that legendary South Newlandian goalkeeper Mikhail Trischuk wore it for basically his entire career as an Elephant, leading South Newlandia to some of their greatest successes (although not including the only big title the nation has ever won).

So far, Edward Khan has certainly been proving that this honour has been warranted. So far, he has conceded only twice, tied for the best mark in the competition, and has been instrumental in leading the pachyderms into the Quarterfinals. They managed to do so by eliminating the Huskies from Mattheland, who gave the Ellies a run for their money despite their underdog status.

The team in bright orange looked better early in the game. Han Ruoyang had not made any changes to his starting formation compared to the team that played against The 14 Stars, but they struggled against a young, dynamic Mattheland team that was clearly trying to show that they were a serious threat. The Elephants continuously struggled to corral the Huskies in the midfield, where the 3-4-1-2 setup was able to keep control of the ball before striking with accurate passes into the middle. In particular, the Elephants never really figured out a way to defend Ausrine Hilotaite. The oldest outfield player in the squad, she led the Huskies with experience while also presenting the Elephants with a matchup nightmare. Neither Luisa Johnson nor Timothy McCoy were able to effectively slow down the quick and clever midfielder, who would then try to find Lehkki and Chevere up front.

In the 28th minute, Hilotaite instead kept the ball herself in a similar situation, and was able to enter the South Newlandian penalty box under-defended. Her accurate shot was met with a sensational save by Khan in goal, directing the shot around the goal and preventing an early, momentum-shifting goal for the Huskies.

While the Elephants started to take more control over the game as time went on, the Huskies continually had the better chances to actually take a lead. With not much time left before half, Lucasz Verkys sent a long pass deep into South Newlandian territory, with Kara Lehkki sprinting after the ball, having already shaken Mary Romero. Edward Khan was forced to attempt to leave the penalty box to clear the ball, arriving to the ball just about at the same time as Lehkki, and managed to head the ball away for a throw-in; a fraction of a second later, and the situation would have ended with a goal or a red card for the most important Elephant on the pitch.

At the half, coach Han Ruoyang was forced to make some changes, but the Elephants came out of the locker room flat again. The Huskies were threatening an upset more and more, but Edward Khan made sure the game stayed tied with some excellent save, earning him another Man of the Match award.

The Elephants would eventually score a goal, and in typical fashion, it would happen almost out of the blue. The Huskies had allowed the Elephants to pick up a corner kick, which was brought in by Luisa Johnson looking for Levin Voigt. He and his defender, Adomas Parn, both rose high in the air, but neither would make good contact with the cross that seemed to glide well in the Fumani air. Instead, Voigt just barely altered the trajectory. Having elongated the cross, it found its way into the orbit of Matias Vaz, who the Huskies understandably had neglected to guard very closely. The short South Newlandian would head the ball on goal, where goalkeeper Gostautas Laune had his vision partially obstructed by Maria Yarikowski and Tom Sloan. When Laune was able to see the imminent danger, it was already too late. Despite the Matthelandic keepers’ attempts to utilize every single centimetre of reach his body would allow, the Elephants were now leading 1-0, and would never look back.

With time dwindling, Mattheland intensified the pressure, including three offensive substitutes, giving the Elephants chances to counter-attack that they weren’t able to use. In the last minute of regular time, the Huskies had one more corner, with Laune joining the outfielders in the penalty box, hoping for a last second goal. Instead, Brittany Edwards cleared out the ball, Lombardo sent it forwards to Seidel, who had a chance to functionally end the game. From about twenty meters, he managed to miss the empty goal, but it didn’t matter – the Elephants had secured their spot in the final eight with a hard-fought 1-0 win.

Their next opponent would see them in another episode of a classic rivalry; perhaps the biggest one South Newlandia has in this sport. Tumbra had successfully managed to defeat Irithoren, bouncing back from a mediocre group stage to establish that they remain title threats. The game will be played in Funami, again, where the Elephants haven’t been elephantastic so far, but Tumbra has been a surprisingly good matchup for this team historically. Their most recent matchup was a strong 0-0 draw at CE36 (in Tumbra!), and they won in another group stage matchup in the edition before that.
And then, there’s the big ones. South Newlandia shocked everyone when they knocked off Tumbra in the CE32 semi-final, en route to a title. One edition earlier, the result had been the opposite, with Tumbra defeating the Elephants in the semis, also en route to their own title.
Those two games are well-remembered, but the two nations also clashed in the World Cup twice; with the Elephants winning both (4-3 and 4-0). The latter game was the one that pushed the Elephants into the World Cup finals for the first time.

In recent years, the Tumbran side has turned into a juggernaut, and the Elephants have largely kept their good record against them by flailing against other teams in early rounds, never even getting to Tumbra. Now, the two will once again match up, and while the Elephants haven’t looked great, the Black Eagles look more vulnerable than they have in a while. Granted, they’re still Tumbra, so there’s a strong chance they’ll rally for yet another regional title.

[Osterhalten]

It was frankly ridiculous how far the Otters had come thus far in the Campionato Esportiva.

The team was made up of the best talents from Osterhalten, of course, but the nation wasn't really known for it's elite football talent. Instead, ice hockey is the typical game of choice for the majority of Osterhalters, and as a result the majority of news coverage back home was focused on the team in Valanora, who had just unfortunately been knocked out of their third consecutive Round of 16 in the World Cup of Hockey, after a third consecutive placement at the top of their group. The Otters in both tournaments ended up only dropping one game in the group stage, leading to upper-half placements for the two teams in the knockout stages, only the football one of which being a surprise.

The initial opener against Tumbra was easily the most shocking victory by the Osterhalters: storming onto the scene and knocking off the 2nd-ranked team in the region?! Virtually unheard of, and set a massive precedent for the things to come by the Otters, raising questions like if this was just a one-off game or if this was somehow sustainable. Fan favorite striker Cesar Haselhurst scored the lone goal in the Otter victory, and goalkeeper Etienne LaCasse was lockdown against the Black Eagles offensive force, allowing no goals on seven shots. Amazingly, this result garnered just about as much attention in the domestic news cycle as the ice hockey team's game, unfortunately blocked a bit due to the conflicting schedules, as every game occurred on the same date just a few hours apart. Nonetheless, the devoted sporting fans back home celebrated all the same, just happy to see Osterhalten succeed in any sport. The Otters were allowed to rest on their laurels for an extra couple days, with a bye day on MD2, coming out with the only undefeated record to that point in the group.

17th-ranked Damukuni was next on the table for Osterhalten. Up to then, Damukuni had posted a 1-0-1 record, with a 3-0 victory over 8th-ranked Lozho to start the tournament, and a subsequent 3-0 loss to Tumbra while the Otters were relaxing, viewing the action from a box in the stadium. Tumbra dominated play in that game, clearly recovered from the antics of the first game. The second game came and the Otters were perhaps too confident heading into the game: they did, after all, beat the team who beat the team they were about to play. Quickly, Damukuni gained strong possession, capitalizing on the over-aggression of the Osterhalten squad to feed off of turnovers and stretch passes that stretched too far or short, left or right. Eventually the majority of possession time switched over, and Cesar Haselhurst struck to open scoring, in a close-range shot that hit the top bar and went downwards, into the net. The second Osterhalten goal came quickly after that, after retaking possession a minute or two after play resumed. Midfielder Phineas Ellsworth took control of the ball, sprinting it up through the left side of the field until he was about 15 meters from the net, when he passed it over to Haselhurst who was standing near the center of the field, guarded loosely by one Damukuni defender. He managed to take possession of the ball, and passed it over to his striker partner Raymond Ludlam, who rocketed it into the net on the first touch. The rest of the game was back and forth, though the Damukuni side retained noticeably more possession. Yet, LaCasse managed to keep his goalless performance alive through his first two performances, as Osterhalten walked to their second consecutive victory in the CE.

[Hapilopper]

Stade de Pruxxe, Pruxxe, Doubeia
Leading up to Campionato Esportiva 38 Quarterfinals: Hapilopper v. TJUN-ia

The locker room of the Stade de Pruxxe, specifically the one where the Hapiloppians were getting ready to play, felt like a war zone - or at least, a ground for soldiers about to do battle. The team was at full strength for the first time in a few days. Rod Cutt, having taken a one-match suspension, was out for the match against Kita-Hinode with a concussion, but was back for the second TJUN-ia match, as was Huntley McCullough, whose cheap shot against Kristina Bay set off this whole discontent. And Huntley was wanting to finish the job against Kristina.

Since the Kita-Hinode match, and ever since the Haps had found out they’d have a rematch with TJUN-ia, they shut the media out. They shut outsiders out. Nobody from the national team spoke to anyone not involved with the team. Those that got close could spot that the intensity had gone up in the last few days. There were rumors of holes in the walls in the team hotel. Rumors of players screaming at each other and in general. And rumors abounded of a huge brawl breaking out between members of the Hapiloppian team during practice, something that wasn’t really denied by anyone. The team was out for blood, and they were out to advance, consequences be damned.

Ernie Stevenson and Thom Perkins sat in the coach’s office of the locker room, discussing tactics, a conversation that had been going on for the last twenty minutes. Ernie, drinking a cup of hot lemon tea, something he had taken to drinking like a habit for the last few months, appeared to have a grim look on his face. So did Thom. Their door was shut as they discussed what they needed to do for what seemed like the toughest match of the campaign. What they hadn’t seen was that, outside, players were taping their hands and wrists up - as if they were preparing for a fistfight, not a football match. Some players had painted their face - in the tradition of the night Hapilopper beat Equestria and avenged the Manehattan Massacre.

And players were starting to hype each other - screaming at each other, yelling their readiness for a brawl. Not a soccer game. A fight. Ernie looked out the window to see Scott Roundtree and Rod Cutt six inches from each other’s faces, yelling at each other. Nobody was attempting to break the two apart - the two were hyping each other up.

“You want to go out there and calm them down?” Thom asked.

“I think I might,” Ernie replied. “I don’t like this.”

But just as Ernie got up out of his chair, someone grabbed a ball and kicked it towards the glass window - as if the window was the goal, as if the glass was Ivan Kozovikov, the goalkeeper for the TJUN-ia Jaguars. The ball was kicked with such force that it not only hit the window - but it shattered it. Glass flew all over the coach’s office as the ball arced downward and hit Thom’s desk.

Thom got up and threw his arms out in frustration. Ernie, meanwhile, stormed out of the coach’s office and demanded to know who kicked that ball.

“God DAMN IT!” Ernie shouted. “What the hell kind of energy is this? We’re here to play a fucking football game, we’re not here to hurt someone! You think this is about a war? God damn it! This kind of energy, we’re going to defeat ourselves out here! If we’re focused more on hurting those sons of bitches, we’re going to screw ourselves, they’re gonna whoop our asses and we’re going to be on the first plane back home!”

“Yeah, but what if they go after us?” Huntley asked.

“If they throw the first punch, then by all mean make them bleed,” Ernie replied. “But don’t throw the first punch. That’s your mistake. You threw the first punch. Roddy threw the first punch against that Indiana Pablo boy and now that’s all people talk about. You know half the teams in the HFA called Dom Probst asking if they could try to sign that kid to their team? But you never initiate. You NEVER initiate. You never start the war. You finish the war.”

Huntley stopped, looked around and nodded his head as Ernie walked closer to him.

“I’m not saying don’t engage,” Ernie replied. “I’m not saying that if they try something you flop to the ground like a fish. You do that and I’ll go out there and kick your ass myself. And that goes for everyone on this team. I’m saying that if they try something, if they try going after you - and if they go after ANY of you - then finish it. Never initiate. Retaliate.

“But I’m not going to tolerate it if you start the brawl,” Ernie continued. “Everyone’s expecting you to start it. Don’t fucking start it. If they start it, finish it. But don’t you fucking start it. Not now, not ever. That’s why I was so pissed off at you, Huntley. What the hell did that girl do to deserve that? And you went out and leveled her? That entire fucking TJUN-ia team’s gonna want your blood. And the same with you, Cutt - you tried to kick that Indiana Pablo kid’s head off and you wrecked yourself. Check yourself before you wreck yourself. But if they try to wreck you? Send their asses to the cleaners.”

Huntley nodded his head. He understood the assignment. He understood what was expected of him - and his teammates. It was going to be really hard of him to restrain himself - but he also knew what Ernie was saying, and he understood it. He agreed with it.

There was so much at stake. Lose this match, and it was time to head home, get ready for the HFA season and then the World Cup 97 qualifying campaign. Win this match, and face down either Osterhalten or Sylestone.

[Tumbra]

Irithoren 0-1 Tumbra

TMB (4-2-3-1): 1 - V Jones; 2 - A Renton, 14 - Y Lawson (5 - W Pritchett, 82'), 20 - B Byrne (24 - H Edwards, 78'), 19 - J McCreary; 15 - L McCormick (25 - H Hindmarsh, 82'), 16 - S Harrington (8 - V Leighton, 88'), 25 - R McLaren; 7 - V Wells (17 - J Berkenbosch, 78'), 21 - A Pearson; 11 - C Henshaw

TMB scorers: Charlotte Henshaw (8')

Player of the Match: Charlotte Henshaw [TMB]

Behind Tumbra's online sports gambling industry — and those who profit from it.
Traditional gambling in Tumbra is heavily restricted, but there are few laws restricting it online — and companies have made full use of it.


A screenshot from a gambling odds website run by Tumbran bookmakers 777.com.

It's safe to say that traditional gambling in Tumbra is the stuff of romance. Heavily regulated by the federal government and essentially only legal in one state — Harren, the tiny northeastern state that serves as the country's horn — the casino has been portrayed almost to death in Tumbran culture. The most famous portrayal of gambling in Tumbra comes from the Alex Gray series of spy novels, in which the series' original author Charles St. Clair opened the first book in the series, Point Nine Three, with an depiction of a baccarat game in which Gray wins $20,000 in one night — and in doing so, earns the ire of a criminal syndicate. The opening was faithfully recreated in the 1963 adaptation of the novel, and scenes in casinos have been a common fixture in Tumbran action movies ever since whenever the plot moves to Harren.

Quite how Harren became the place for Tumbran gambling is a story for another time and another news outlet; but the gist of it is that Harren, back in the late Imperial era of Tumbra, was ruled over by Prince Henry, a distant cousin of the emperors of the waning Tumbran empire. Henry required a revenue stream to both support the people of the state, and supporting his own lavish lifestyle, and soon built a casino on the Harren waterfront. The royal family in Kingsbury were at first unimpressed, but then gave Henry exclusive rights to run casinos in Tumbra, seeing how successful the first one was. There is historical evidence that he intended to build casinos all over the empire, but the minor problem of civil war soon put an end to that; Henry was shot on the second day of hostilities after local republican forces stormed his palace. The ownership of the Harren Casino passed to the new government, who soon legislated that casinos could only be built in Harren, with state residents explicitly banned from entering. That ban stood until 1982, when it was replaced by a 100-dollar levy.

That's it for traditional gambling — slot machines, blackjack tables, roulette wheels and the like. Till this day gambling is regulated federally, much to the ire of the private sector. But what is less regulated is betting, and in particular online betting, which as an industry was worth nearly $25 billion in 2038. Bookmakers, incensed by over-regulation of physical betting, moved their operations online as soon as possible when the Internet boomed in the last years of the 20th century; and while regulation was planned, a sudden change of government in 2000 put paid to those ideas. Online gambling has largely been legal since; websites like 777.com, King Bet, and DoubleDutch have and do largely flood the online space with constant advertisments cajoling Tumbrans to spend their hard-earned money online.

But the ownership of those websites is much less transparent; while, for example, 777 is supposedly owned by Maureen Healey, while DoubleDutch has Richard Jans at its head, there has been a long-held suspicion that those two are but sock puppets for either local Tumbrans or foreign money. Matchday can today show that the DoubleDutch website, incorporated in Harren but founded in Southport in 1985, is actually owned by Aurora Media Group proprietor Charles Harrison, and most of the annual profits made by DoubleDutch — tallying nearly $7 billion, tax free — go to him. Doing so has taken nearly three months of work, not just in Tumbra, but also in Kotzellach, renowned for its secretive banking system and notorious for being a tax haven where Tumbran companies are known to park their profits, and other countries like Xinhua and Yolcan, where DoubleDutch has set up operations. In doing so, the DoubleDutch ownership structure can be likened to that of an onion, with so many layers attempting to conceal its true ownership; the only difference between this and a regular onion is that the onion's layers all lead back to the same thing.

LAYER ONE: DOUBLEDUTCH

DoubleDutch is publicly owned by two entities. The first, Richard Jans, is a Southport-born Tumbran with Licentian heritage. Jans, 65, is the son of one of the original founders of DoubleDutch — so named because it was an alliance between two bookmakers whose proprietors were both of Licentian descent in — and inherited the business upon his father's death in 2031. But way before Jans took over, his father, Frederick, sold 38% of the company to a Kotzellach-incorporated company known as Dopplehorn Investitionen AG in 2004. This is the second entity that owns DoubleDutch. 38% rose to 49% just four years later, and later became 67% in 2025, with the Jans family retaining all executive positions in the new company. In a 2028 parliamentary hearing on problem gambling, the younger Jans made a deposition to the committee, stating that "Dopplehorn's ownership allows us to operate with much more flexibility in overseas markets [...] the Kotzellach corporate regime is much more lax than that in Tumbra." In that same hearing, however, he denied that DoubleDutch did so in order to skirt Tumbran corporate regulations, maintaining that the company held "full adherence" to Tumbran corporate law and it did pay corporate taxes fully. In 2034, however, Jans made a puzzling move; he incorporated a new company in Harren, became CEO, and then transferred the ownership of his share of the company to that new company.

Investigations into the ownership of that company — Stroopapa LLC — have revealed that much of the capital provided for its startup came from Venture Ventures,, an investment firm which is itself owned by...Charles Harrison. Strike one.

LAYER TWO: DOPPLEHORN

Kotzellach finance is infamously exceptionally hard to find out about — so much so that Tumbran universities often offer a course on the finance system of Kotzellach and its associated law in their business schools — but through tracing the financial records of other countries where Dopplehorn does business reveals a paper trail that eventually leads back to Harrison...again. Dopplehorn is ostensibly another investment firm, but one that has operations throughout the world, mainly dealing in property and entertainment. Entertainment in this case seemingly also means the gambling business; it fully owns the Yolcan-based gambling business Buentiempo, while in Xinhua it owns 47% of 888.co, another online gambling business.

The remaining 53% of 888 is owned by local businessmen, though Dopplehorn is the single largest stakeholder in 888. But it was Buentiempo that allowed for Matchday to fully uncover the secrets behind Dopplehorn's — and thus Harrison's — ownership. Strike two.

Of course, we could go on forever about the tangled web of ownership of Tumbra's betting industry; but there has o be some nods of recognition amongst Tumbra-based readers. Yes, DoubleDutch does advertise on Aurora media channels; which opens up the pesky question of whether Harrison is a) feeding money to himself through paying his own company money from another company he owns and b) engaged in a severe conflict of interest. Problem gambling rates in Tumbra have risen since the rise of online betting, and while regulators have called called further regulation, little has been done. Perhaps this reveal will spark further investigation; perhaps nothing will happen. But as bets flow in on Tumbra's quarter-final game against South Newlandia, or perhaps more tantalisingly, the Hapilopper-TJUN-ia game (both are on 9/1), it seems quite positive that nothing, in the short-term, will stem the flow of online betting money.

[Fhulghamous Peninsula]

Polynikis Kalyftakis would have thought, maybe even hoped, that his little “pep talk,” if it could even be called that, after scoring the winning goal against Esportivan Darmen in the group stage of the 38th Campionato Esportiva would have resolved the issue between the team’s two starting strikers, Alibek Sokolov and Cosmas Stamatelopoulos. Things had been working out so well for the Peninsula back when those two were still on the same page, but once the going got tough, the partnership had been all but abandoned. Cosmas had started the trend of forcing the goal all by himself against EspoDarmen when it looked like the latter was going to hold the defending Esportivan champions to a scoreless draw. Polynikis had seen the growing discord between the team’s front two, and he had attempted to solve the problem before it grew bigger and out of control by taking matters into his own hands and scoring the winning goal himself. However, it might have actually done more harm than good since now at least one of those two believed that their captain didn’t believe that he had what it takes to be a game changer.

“Don’t think I don’t know what you’re trying to do, man,” Alibek Sokolov had told Polynikis during the team’s final official training session before the Fhulghamous’s match against Doubeia, one of the two hosts of the current Campionato. “I know what you’re trying to do, Nicky. But it’s not going to work. Look, I want it to work, but now Cosmas thinks that you don’t trust him to score in the big moments, and we both know that that’s a bad thing.”

“Goddamn it,” Polynikis muttered as he ran a hand over his face. “That’s the last thing that this team needs. First, the guy hogs the ball because he wants to be the guy that scores in the big moments. Then, you try to one-up him for whatever reason instead of trying to talk some sense into the guy, and now Cosmas thinks no one trusts him. That’s great. That’s just great. Now what the hell am I supposed to tell Coach? What am I supposed to expect from Cosmas now? More of the same? Or is he not going to bother anymore?”

“I’m not the one you should be asking, Nick,” Sokolov shrugged. “Cosmas and I haven’t sorted it out yet like you told us to do last time. I only ever found out that’s what Cosmas thinks because I heard some of the others talking about it. Wait, does that make me a snitch or something? Because I don’t want to get stabbed or something like that on the way back to the hotel.”

“Ali, this is a football team, not prison,” Polynikis rolled his eyes. “No one’s going to stab anybody. And you’re the vice-captain so no one’s going to think twice if they see you talking to me or whatever. But if you’re really that worried for your organs or whatever, why don’t you talk to Cosmas and try to sort this out? You don’t even have to ask for his forgiveness or whatever; just make sure that the two of you are going to be on the same page come the game against Doubeia. That is what the team needs. You think you can do that?”

“I can’t promise anything, Nick,” Sokolov shook his head. “Last I saw him, Cosmas was pretty pissed at me.”

“Then don’t promise me anything,” Polynikis retorted. “That way I won’t have to expect anything from you except scoring those goals.”

The game against Doubeia was a mixed bag of results for Polynikis Kalyftakis. On one hand, the Fhulghamous Peninsula got the victory over one-half of the hosts and Alibek Sokolov’s name was back on the scoresheet, but on the other hand, Cosmas Stamatelopoulos still looked like he was pissed off at his strike partner. This issue became apparent when Cosmas started jawing with Sokolov after the latter had scored the Colonists’ second goal. It must have looked a strange sight for everyone in the situation: two teammates who were supposed to be working together were now in each other’s faces for whatever reason. It was supposed to be a celebration of the Fhulghamous securing passage to the knockout stage of the Campionato Esportiva once again. Luckily, pretty much everyone wearing a neon green jersey was on hand to break up what could have been a fight, with Polynikis hauling off his own vice-captain for a little chat. “What the hell is going on, Ali?!” Polynikis asked. “I thought I told you to fix this problem that you and Cosmas have!”

“What the heck do you think I’ve been doing all this time?” Sokolov shot back. “I’ve been trying to find a way to get back on his good terms but he’s just not having it! I’ve tried to give him chances to score but now it looks like he’s actively trying not to let me give him an assist! I don’t know what the fuck I’m supposed to do anymore in this situation, man!”

“Oh, great,” Polynikis nodded. “That’s just fucking great. Now I have a player on my team that doesn’t want to be assisted by his literal strike partner. This is now officially a fuckfest of epic proportions.”

And the fuckfest would indeed continue into the second half as Marcelino Anaya, one of Polynikis’s fellow defenders, saw red in both a figurative and literal sense when he somehow ended up being the last man defending against a surprise Doubeian counterattack that practically took out the rest of the Peninsula’s defense. Anaya already knew that he was going to be carded, but he went in for the tackle anyway, and in the process he looked like he took out one of the attacker’s knees as well. But even as the red card was coming out of the referee’s pocket, another Doubeian player was already in Anaya’s face, and soon both teams were surrounding their respective players to prevent things escalating even further.

“Come on, get out of here, Coach will talk to you later,” Polynikis told Anaya even as the latter was already on his way off the pitch for an early shower. Because the player that Anaya had tackled was still down and had his team’s physios dealing with him, Fhulghamous Peninsula manager Donovan Chase had taken the opportunity to hold an impromptu meeting with his players who were still on the pitch. It consisted of the usual tactical changes made in response to going down to ten men, but now those tactics also had to take into account the fact that their opponent was also down to ten men. And then, just before he was about to leave and take his place in the back line once again, Polynikis Kalyftakis was stopped by his manager. “What’s going on with Sokolov and Cosmas? Why aren’t they passing it to each other anymore?” Donovan Chase asked his captain.

“It’s a long story, Coach,” Polynikis replied. “I can’t tell you everything right now, but I really think you should drop those two for our next game. Ali and Cosmas have not been on the same page since EspoDarmen, and it could cost us in the playoffs.”

---

  FHULGHAMOUS PENINSULA 4 - 1 THE 14 STARS  
     EL-AMIN (14', 67')       BLADE (43')
    MATSOURAS (28, 55')

[Sylestone]

"GALLAGHER NEEDS TO START" - THIRTY MILLION SYLESTONEANS

SOLVECERE, DOUBEIA - In the wake of a wildly disappointing group stage that saw the Sentients barely - even undeservedly - qualify as one of the four best third-placed teams in the competition, losing games to tricky opposition in Hapilopper and TJUN-ia to see themselves languish, losing pretty much all hopes they had of clinching their first Campionato Esportiva. At no point did they appear their dominant best - one that had caused disarray amongst many an opponent over the past few years, culminating with a third-placed finish at last year’s World Cup from the very bottom of pot two - but there was none of that here.

Until they arrived in Solvecere for their round of sixteen fixture against Dod Rava, that is. That was when the tides began to change.

Sure, a full ninety minutes against Dod Rava later, there were still some things that weren’t quite clicking. The attack was faulty - the linkup between Brett Sarcav-Jones and Charlotte Eastwood was struggling, and Dod Rava’s stout defensive setup ensured that the Sylestonean wingers failed to make so much of an impact with their speedy runs into wide pockets of the field and provide their signature deadly crosses to those waiting in the middle, or circulating the ball back to the midfielders to launch an attack. This was what Alexandra Arnold and Jack Ryland were forced to do and from there, the Group F table toppers were capable of shutting them out.

But as time went on, the Sentients could not score a goal. By the time the regular ninety minutes were up and the game moved into second half stoppage, the scores were still deadlocked. At one end, Sylestone had amassed a whopping 2.02 expected goals, while Dod Rava had simply 0.17 from three shots all game - two from outside the box and the other a fairly tame strike at Ryan Macleay from a tight angle that he gobbled up without issue. It was a similar story for the Sentients - the vast majority of their 20 shots had been attempted glory strikes from further out or from difficult angles, most of which did not appear close to troubling the Dod Ravan goalkeeper. Sure, a couple of them - mainly from Jack Lawson - just brushed the outside of the post and sent many hearts into mouths, but for the most part they were fairly circumspect.

A couple of those chances, however, really should’ve been scored. Gemma Rodway fluffed a cutback from Brett Sarcav-Jones (admittedly it was a very good piece of defending to shut her down so quickly and force a ricochet from her eventual shot), but it was Charlotte Eastwood who really struggled, a couple of brilliant through balls from Lawson seeing her fail to bypass the Dod Ravan goalkeeper, who came up strong several times for the slight underdogs of the clash, despite their commanding group stage performance. Perhaps it was due to her lack of playing time as an out-and-out striker with Lakewood United, or maybe she was just in a rut of poor form. Either way, she’d be back. At least Lawson, who had been in the midst of a horror stretch throughout the tournament that saw many calls for his dropping from the starting XI after consecutive substitutions against Macbon and TJUN-ia, had returned to close to his brilliant best that saw many a media site place him in the World Cup 96 team of the tournament and one of the world’s best current midfielders. Sure, like the rest of the Sentients, he wasn’t quite there again yet, but the improvement was clear.

But Sylestone needed something different. Dod Rava had long since given up trying to score a goal, instead looking to perhaps pounce during extra time and if not, take their opponents to penalties where it was anyone’s game. Or maybe not ,given that Sylestone had quite literally never lost on penalties, but whatever. An irrelevant statistic.

But Morgan Gallagher, he provided that something different. As soon as he was unleashed for Gemma Rodway in the 80th minute, he looked completely at home in the Sentients’ midfield setup, linking up well with Lawson and Sarcav-Jones to create plenty of chances. And in the very first minute of four allocated for stoppage, Gallagher took his chance.

All game, the Sentients had opted for a pass first, dribble later strategy, preferring to use their technical proficiency as a team to play around the compact Dod Ravan defence, or chipping them in an effort to find the forward runs of Eastwood or Sarcav-Jones. But no, Gallagher had other ideas. Unlike pretty much everyone else, the Couno-based central midfielder simply ran straight at them, sending them scrambling with deft footwork to dissect them straight through the heart. And then, spotting an opportunity, he took his shot, almost passing it beyond the goalkeeper into his bottom right, the stadium silenced in shock.

It was one of the goals of the tournament, and possibly one of the best in Gallagher’s entire career to date, but he didn’t care. It was the goal that ensured his nation’s progression to the final eight of the Campionato Esportiva, preventing a complete embarrassment by the skin of their teeth. Sure, a quarterfinal exit against a strong Osterhalten side (they literally beat Tumbra) would be far from a success, but at least it wouldn’t leave everyone in complete shame. It wasn’t probably even respectable for the Sentients’ lofty standards but, y’know, it could’ve been worse.

We’ll see what happens.

---

Sylestone vs Restresas @ Pomeranian Hub, Port Pomeranian, Tumbra

Sylestone (4-4-1-1 → 5-4-1): Wettenhall - Mornington ( 81’) - Blackall - Molineux (Baldwinson 58’); Ryland - Gallagher (Rodway 78’) - Lawson - Arnold; Hellyer ( 13’) (Sarcav-Jones 58’); Eastwood (Yelverton 89’)

Restresas (4-2-4): George; Jones ( 49’) - M Lindsay (the defender) - S Sanchez (J Albu 79’) - Mark; L Sanchez (Hagi 71’) - M Lindsay (the midfielder) (Powas 86’); Cojocar - P Albu (the 28yo) (Dedmon 71’) - P Albu (the 30yo) - Pablo

Sylestone 1-0 Restresas
                                          Hellyer 84’

[FRIENDLY] Sylestone vs South Newlandia @ Independence Lane, Millsburgh, Tumbra

Sylestone (4-4-1-1): Macleay; Llewellyn (Wettenhall 83’) - Yelverton - Blackall (Weston 83’) - Molineux; Ryland - Gallagher (Crommelin 83’) - Woodfull - Arnold (Cayley 68’); Sarcav-Jones (Hellyer 68’); Freeling

South Newlandia (3-2-3-2): Khan; Vaz - Romero (Edwards 77’) - Harrison; Johnson - McCoy (Behera 54’); Lange-Parker - Lombardo - Voigt; Seidel (Castillo 54’) - Baumann

Sylestone 2-0 South Newlandia
                                    Freeling  60'
                                    Gallagher 66'

Sylestone vs Macbon @ Pomeranian Hub, Port Pomeranian, Doubeia

Sylestone (4-4-1-1): Macleay; Wettenhall - Mornington - Blackall ( 31’) (Faucett 69’) - Molineux (Baldwinson 22’); Milligan (Ryland 69’) - Gallagher - Lawson (Rodway 69’) - Arnold; Sarcav-Jones (Crommelin 84’); Eastwood

Macbon: Unknown

Sylestone 1-0 Macbon
                                           Eastwood 17'

Sylestone vs TJUN-ia @ The Igloo, Winterfalls, Doubeia

Sylestone (4-4-1-1 → 4-2-3-1): Macleay ( 72’); Wettenhall - Mornington - Blackall - Baldwinson ( 81’); Milligan (Ryland 46’ ( 49’)) - Rodway (Gallagher 58’) - Lawson (Hellyer 46’ ( 89’)) - Arnold; Sarcav-Jones; Eastwood (Freeling 77’)

TJUN-ia (4-1-2-1-2): Kozovikov; Thuyet (Mikazawa 76’) - Lopez - Moukaddem - Dlamini; Zinchenko (Robertson 86’); Djé-Djé ( 21’) (Monroe 60’) - McDuff; Bay (Issigonis 60’); Fernandinho ( 68’) - Fiedtkou (Sharafutdinov 86’)

Sylestone 1-3 TJUN-ia
                                          Eastwood 23’       Fiedtkou 68’
                                                               Issigonis 64’
                                                               Monroe 78’

Sylestone vs Dod Rava @ Sirotkin Stadium, Solvecere, Doubeia

Sylestone (4-4-1-1): Macleay; Wettenhall - Mornington - Blackall - Molineux (Baldwinson 68’); Ryland (Milligan 68’) - Rodway (Gallagher 80’) - Lawson - Arnold (Cayley 80’); Sarcav-Jones; Eastwood (Hackett 87’)

Dod Rava: Unknown

Sylestone 1-0 Dod Rava
                                       Gallagher 90+1'

---

Starting XI vs Osterhalten @ Harriott Loft, Ethelfled, Doubeia

Macleay; Wettenhall - Mornington - Blackall - Molineux; Ryland - Gallagher - Lawson - Arnold; Sarcav-Jones; Eastwood

[Doubeia]

Campionato Esportiva 38
Quarterfinals Results — Riena Half

Fhulghamous Peninsula 3–3 Slembana
after extra time; 3-3 after normal time; Slembana win 3-4 on penalties
Seaside Field, Anzumori, Riena

Tumbra 1–0 South Newlandia
Funami Metropolitan Stadium, Funami, Riena

---

Campionato Esportiva 38
Semifinal Fixtures — Riena Half

Slembana vs Tumbra
Minami Arch, Maihama, Riena

---

[Riena]

Campionato Esportiva 38
Quarterfinal Results — Doubeia Half

Osterhalten 0–2 Sylestone
Harriott Loft, Ethelfled, Doubeia

Hapilopper 2-1 TJUN-ia
after extra time; 1-1 after normal time
Stade de Pruxxé, Pruxxé, Doubeia

---

Campionato Esportiva 38
Semifinal — Doubeia Half

Sylestone versus Hapilopper
The Igloo, Winterfalls, Doubeia

---

[TJUN-ia]

The Random Rambles of a Jaguar - Cup of Harmony 88 Edition
with Killian Looker

If we were going to fall, the devil himself makes sense.

I mean, why are you surprised we lost to Hapilopper?
They are a story.
We were a story, once upon a time, but our time in the spotlight has long since vanished into the sands of time.
Hapilopper got here first, has integrated fully with Esportiva first, so of course, they beat us here.
They always find a way to beat us.

At least we took them to extra time. At least we went out in a blaze of glory.
At least hope has returned to our football once again.
WC97 may be the one that decides everything for the future, but only time will tell.
For now, just like our team after the final whistle, we must quickly exit the pitch and head home.

We tried to play like adults. But in the end, we may never grow up.
Because we have a place here in the hierarchy. One in which we try to leave, but always find our way back to.
This is the way of TJUN-ia.
Always has, and always will.

See you next year.
GO JAGS!

---

SCHEDULE (Group E, Doubeia)
MD1: vs Macbon (15) - Pomeranian Hub, Port Pomeranian W 4-1 (1st)
MD2: BYE (2nd)
MD3: vs Hapilopper (26)* - Pomeranian Hub, Port Pomeranian W 3-1 (1st)
*Nathan Ellis Memorial Game
MD4: vs Restresas (UR) - The Igloo, Winterfalls W 2-1 (1st/Q)
MD5: vs Sylestone (1) - The Igloo, Winterfalls W 3-1 (1st/Q/4-0-0/12pts/+8GD)
---------------------------------------------------
Ro16: vs #14 Damukuni (17/C3) - Town Hall Stadium, Queensland W 4-1
QF: vs #7 Hapilopper (26/E2) - Stade de Pruxxé, Pruxxé L 1-2 (AET)

[Hapilopper]

Stade de Pruxxe, Pruxxe, Doubeia
Campionato Esportiva 38 Quarterfinals: Hapilopper v. TJUN-ia

For the first time in about twenty years, Thom Perkins thought about wanting to smoke a cigarette. It was injury time of the second half of the quarterfinals of Campionato Esportiva, an epic match - one that felt like a war - between the Hapiloppians and TJUN-ia. The tension in the match had been unbelievable, and it seemed that - like the match against Restresas, it was a powder keg waiting to go off. But this one wasn’t because of two aggressive teams bouncing off each other. There was a genuine feeling on this evening that these two teams hated each other’s guts.

Everyone could feel it. Back home in Hapilopper, those that turned on the match on the Hapilopper Television Network could hear an air raid siren to kick off the broadcast and images of wars from elsewhere in the multiverse - promising that this match would be more than just a soccer match, but a “war,” as Killian Looker of TJUN-ia had promised.

There had been a few near-misses that could have become flashpoints. In the 19th minute, Stephan Fiedtkou and Arn March collided rushing towards the Hapiloppian goal - not anything malicious, just hard-nosed football. The ball went one way. The two went another way and Lou Hyde, in goal for the Haps, had to dive out of the way to avoid getting mowed down by the tumbling players. He grabbed the ball and, for a second, thought about spiking it off Fiedtkou’s head. And in the 30th minute, Fernandino, scoring the first goal of the match, did it by seemingly breaking Rod Cutt’s ankles. Just like what happened with Indiana Pablo of Restresas. Rod got up and for a brief moment, started towards Fernandino. But then he looked towards the sideline, towards Ernie Stevenson, and nodded his head.

He could see Ernie leaving the sideline, walking on the pitch and pointing at him to stop. It was a warning.

In the third minute of injury time - just before the whistle was sounded to end the first half, the powder keg almost exploded - thanks to the two people that started the whole situation in the first place, Huntley McCullough and Kristina Bay. Bay had an opportunity to make it 2-0 TJUN-ia when McCullough, sensing a last ditch effort to stop a goal, pushed Bay out of the way and cleared the ball the other way. And for a brief moment, play got started up again on the other side of the pitch.

That play came to a very quick end, however, when both teams realized that McCullough and Bay were screaming at each other - and pretty much daring the other to throw down. The referee never blew the play dead. He never needed to. The other 20 players and officials on the field rushed towards the scene as the two appeared to get closer to each other, daring the other to throw the first punch.

“Do it,” Huntley shouted. “I know you want to.”

Thankfully, nothing came of it. Both sides took their player away and settled them down - or so it seemed. A few reporters standing outside the Hapiloppian locker room reported hearing screaming and metal getting bashed loudly behind a closed door.

What was going on was that inside that locker room, all hell was breaking loose. Huntley was fired all the way up and he was firing his teammates up as well, screaming at them to get their heads in the game. Screaming at Thom Perkins and Ernie Stevenson to let them go all the way. It got to the point that Rod Cutt got right up out of his chair and slapped Huntley right across the face. Huntley responded by screaming a roar of approval, and then slapped Rod right back. Rod screamed that same roar of approval and slapped Huntley back.

You could see how fired up the entire team was as they came out from under the tunnel to start the second half. Rod Cutt stormed out to the Hapiloppian goal, pointed his finger toward the rowdy Hapiloppians - known in a past life as “The Traveling Thrashers,” and gave a gesture that looked eerily similar to one given by Nathan Ellis just before the start of the legendary Hapilopper-Equestria match from 13 years before, when Hapilopper avenged the Manehattan Massacre and became the unofficial lineal World Champions of international football.

In the second half, it seemed like the Haps had turned it up a wick, firing on all cylinders, playing that much harder. Their offense, bombarding the TJUN-ian defense and keeper Ivan Kozovikov, was the kind of “Funball” that Nathan Ellis had preached late in his life. Sooner or later, the Hapiloppians were going to break through.

And in the 50th minute, they did break through - in the form of an alley-oop goal from Stan McLamb and Tad Winslow. McLamb fired it towards Winslow, who bicycle-kicked it towards goal and past a diving Kozovikov, who probably zigged when he should have zagged. Winslow, on the ground, rolled over to see if the ball had gone into the net. A huge smile emerged on his face when he saw the back of the net and Kozovikov look back to see where the ball landed.

But as it turned out, that was the last goal scored in regular time. It seemed the Jaguars turned up the wick to keep the Haps from scoring another - and what resulted was an intense, electrifying game of football. For 40 minutes, the Haps and the Jaguars were locked in the kind of football game that would drive a man to light up a cigarette just to calm himself down. A man like Thom Perkins, who was weirdly craving one right now. He walked past Ernie, who could see the harried look on his boss’s face. Ernie figured the stress was getting to Thom, just like it was for him.

TJUN-ia was never going to be easy.

TJUN-ia was never going to be a cakewalk.

TJUN-ia was always going to be frightening to even think about.

No wonder Thom wanted a smoke.

As extra time started, you could feel that stress in the stadium. You could feel it envelope you. Anyone inside that stadium could feel the butterflies in their stomach as the extra time got started. Even the Hapiloppians were feeling that tension. They sensed they’d have to get lucky to put one in the net, past Kozovikov and into the lead. Outplaying TJUN-ia seemed impossible, they were such a great team. They’d have to get lucky.

Ten minutes into extra time, they got lucky. Jared Kelcey and Tad Winslow looked over towards the TJUN-ian goal and spotted a hole. Both nodded at each other and rushed downfield with the ball - Kelcey and Winslow passing the ball between each other. Realizing the Jaguars were picking up on it, Winslow misdirected, fired the ball to Ben Fairchild, and Fairchild launched a bullet toward goal - from 35 yards out. Right past Kozovikov, and right into the back of the net.

The Hapiloppians couldn’t help themselves. All of them rushed towards Fairchild - and so did everyone on the sidelines. The coaches, the bench players, trainers, everyone. It was like a gigantic release of euphoria - even if there was a little bit of time left. The excessive celebration - at least in the eyes of the referee, led to a yellow card for Fairchild, which he nodded at and accepted with a smile and a thumbs-up.

But even the desparation counter-attack from the Jaguars was not enough. The Haps had won. They had avenged the meltdown in the Nathan Ellis game. They had gone through to the semifinals, and were guaranteed to play two more games. If they beat Sylestone, they’d be going for Campionato Esportiva glory. If they lost, they’d be going for third place.

Hapiloppian football was well and truly back.

[Tumbra]

"Seven," said Edward Maddison, almost incredulously, looking over the morning edition of Matchday, which had begun publishing a print edition despite the ever-diminishing relevance of print media. The "bloke" market had to be met somehow. "Seven," he grumbled, shoving the paper into the lap of Jude McCreary, who was eating breakfast next to him. "I score a goal within fifty seconds of the second half starting, and I get a seven."

"Joint highest rating in the game, at least," said McCreary, looking over the figures. "That's annoying. Substitutes has no colon, but the other three categories do."

"That's what you're looking at?"

"Well, the ratings seem about fair. Especially since Matchday went and hired, I think, the guy from Gazeta sporta to do them, or at least teach them how to do it. So they're stricter these days. And hey, he gave Romero a three, that's about fair for his slip that gave you the goal."

"Well, don't want people thinking I gave an average performance," Maddison huffed.

"You've been playing too much Back of the Net, huh," said McCreary as he ate some pasta. "And it depends on who they brought in to actually do the ratings. Who'd they send last night? Sometimes the reporter doesn't much like offensive performances."

"Yeah, you're right, it's probably —" Maddison grabbed the paper back, and squinted at the name of the reporter who covered the game. "Nigel Erskine," he mumbled under his breath.

"Sorry, who was it?"

"Nigel Erskine," said Maddison, closing his eyes. "Says here. Rated by Luke Edwards — that's probably the reporter at the game — and special guest correspondent Nigel Erskine." Erskine was a striker for Tumbra back when he played, with a strike rate far more impressive than most; he'd almost become a cult hero of sorts. "I'm cooked, aren't I?"

"Well," said McCreary, puncturing the membrane of an egg yolk with a fork, trying to avoid telling Maddison that he'd actually been average. "Maybe Erskine's just stricter. 'tis all."