by sann0638
Eurobowl X was the third largest Blood Bowl event ever, with a 144 player National team tournament running concurrently with a 120 player Open tournament. The vast majority of players were staying in the hotel that was hosting the tournament, and the majority of them were to be found in and around the bar for most of Friday, Saturday and Sunday evenings, making for a superb sociable atmosphere all weekend. In addition, there were around a dozen Belgian non-playing organisers making things run smoothly all weekend, making almost 300 mad-keen BB players in attendance.
The Eurobowl nations for this tournament were as follows:
| Austria | Denmark | Finland | Italy | Portugal | Sweden |
| Belgium | England | Germany | Netherlands | Scotland | Switzerland |
| Da Pirates | France | Hungary | Norway | Spain | Wales |
What? Pirates? This team has competed at a fair few Eurobowls, as each Eurobowl needs an even number of nations, and this happens surprisingly infrequently. The Pirates is made up of a team of Freebooters from different nations, which this year included Beppe, the NAF President.
What were the teams playing for? Well, England and Italy were on 3 wins each, and each wanted to nudge ahead in the pecking order. Germany had never won, despite having some of the best players in the world. France have strength in depth like no other nation (witness the preponderance of French teams in the top echelons of the EurOpen standings) and are keen to get more stars on their shirts. In addition, Sweden, Portugal, Wales and Scotland were vying to host in 2016 and 2017, as they had not hosted before and the Eurobowl rules keep the hosts rotating based on performance in the Eurobowl. The individual Pirates were keen to show that they should have been selected for their national teams, and each individual player in every team wanted to come away with a 2-2-2 or better result.
Players arrived during the day on the Friday, and by the evening meal most players were there for the first of the excellent three-course meals over the weekend. Being fully fed, it was time for the opening ceremony, a small amount of chat about the organisation of the weekend, and then on with the live draw for the first round. The “home” teams were drawn first, and then the tension mounted as their opponents were drawn – Scotland v England being most people’s pick of Round 1!
The Captains’ Meeting followed, with chat about hosting rights and the rules of Eurobowl. Good commitment from all attendees, as it delayed their return to the bar.
Saturday dawned, with all Eurobowl teams and most EurOpen teams resplendent in matching uniforms. The two large rooms were arranged with the top tables of EuroBowl and the bottom tables of EurOpen in one room and vice versa in the other, with separate scoring stations for the two tournaments. It was time to unveil a fantastic innovation for this tournament – the live stream of one table per round. This was popular around the world, and will no doubt be replicated at large tournaments whenever the equipment is available. England overcame Scotland, though not by as much as their pre-game boasting suggested!
After a bit of fiddling with Score, rounds 2 and 3 followed, and the bar was already starting to run low on beer (though they managed to restock successfully to keep the show on the road). A few teams headed out into Oostende when others hit the bar again, and still others made the most of having the run of the venue to set up the traditional Saturday night gaming. Some nations were keeping themselves fresh, others were drowning their sorrows.
At the beginning of day 2 France were leading, closely followed by Switzerland and England. Scotland were facing off Sweden in one of many “battles for hosting”, and Wales and Finland were battling for the spoon. It was in this round however that England took pole position in the Eurobowl, as they demolished Denmark 6-2 (possible revenge for the “flag incident”?). Scotland – Sweden ended in a draw, as did the Iberian face-off between Portugal and Spain. France only managed a 4.5 – 3.5 over Switzerland.
It was time for voting and more food, as the nominees for best painted were put out to display. These were a mixture of display bases, themes and simple excellent painting drawn from both competitions.
England then consolidated their position with another big win, this time over Switzerland, whereas Denmark took their revenge by reversing their previous scoreline, this time over Scotland. It was time for the Scottish Humans to take their turn in the limelight of the livestream, possibly influenced by their inclusion in best-painted, but given that the first round of lovely Belgian beer had been bought at 11am, this may not have been the best idea! France narrowly lost to Italy, meaning that any win for England over Italy in the final round would give them the 4th star on the shirts.
Round 6 matches
England – Italy
France – Denmark
Spain – Sweden
Portugal – Switzerland
Belgium – Germany
Scotland – Norway
Pirates – Wales
Holland – Finland
Austria – Hungary
If you don’t know the final results yet, you might want to catch up with the recorded coverage, that was livestreamed at the time, but if not, the results were…
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are you sure?
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England win! Lutece Noobz take the EurOpen!
We will be heading to Sweden in 2016, then Portugal in 2017! You can see the full list of results for Eurobowl and EurOpen on the Articles page, and comprehensive photos, as through the whole weekend, on the Eurobowl Facebook group. Apologies to those not on Facebook, but it’s almost worth joining just for the 100s of photos that you can find there. Well done to Tom for the comprehensive Facebook coverage over the weekend, as well as the TFF update thread.
Thanks due to all the organisers, especially Driesfield as head honcho. The hosts have already taken on lots of feedback, and Dries is incorporating it into a “large tournament handbook”, which will appear soon. Appetites have been well and truly whetted for the NAF World Cup – Lucca, Italy, November 2015.