JDG vs twl
UN Season 9, Div 2, Round 6
"Guess who's back. Back again. Classe's back. Tell a friend."
You didn't think you would get rid of me that easily? After this meager rap atempt perhaps I should get on with the "show".
I wasn't supposed to be writing this since I couldn't play on our regular matchday, but since we had some trouble getting a full team for the match JDG graciously agreed to move the match four days forward to our regular practice day. This means that I will be your twl-matchreporter for one more time this season. Our opponents JDG is one of the clans we know best. Having faced eachother for the first time way back in season 2 and having been practice partners on and off since then. JDG is probably the clan we have faced most times of any clan, with 23 practice games and 2 UN games.
The two previous times we had met in UN didn't go well for us. JDG had won resounding 3-0 victories both times. At the start of the season it felt like we had the upper hand on JDG since our practice games went mostly our way, but the last few weeks JDG has turned the tables around and pounded us pretty good. It felt like JDG had the advantage but we hoped we could play to the best of our abilities and give them a match worth playing.
The maps this evening was UN_Kharkov and Battle of Ihantala. Over the seasons Ihantala usually has been pretty good to us, but we also have some horrid memories from one game against WWL when we almost lost a division title by a huge mistake in a single round. UN_Kharkov on the other hand has always been kind of a mixed bag, still it was the map we had highest hopes for in this match. We knew we were in for a tough ride, especially since our practice games on these two maps(one against JDG no less) had seen us pretty demolished. Still, our final practice before the UN match went well and gave us some hope for the coming bout.
On a sidenote this will be our 60'th game in UN(discounting matches with teams that has dropped out, and including the 4on4 seasons). Quite a nice round number to end 9(+2 4on4) seasons of BF42 on.
Round 1 - UN_Kharkov
JDG - Allies
twl - Axis
All carefully wrought plans just went out the window in the first minute. JDG were lightningquick to get a wingwalk to the hill going and easily captured it. This made it doubly hard for our airforce get the job done as they had to contest with AA fire as well as the JDG pilots. We did manage to capture the eastern flag, but we had ticketbleed on us. Our initial attack to the hill managed to contest it but JDG were too many and beat us back.
Their planes had blown up our tanks and their own tanks could unhindered advance through the ruins and find some sweet positions. We had a hellish time trying to reach the hill as numerous infantry as well as tanks covered the approaches. Instead we managed to sneak around and capture the western flag, to turn ticketbleed in the right direction. We were happy to see their tickets go down as they had hardly lost any tickets so far. Sadly we didn't reinforce and mine the entrances to the western flag and could only manage to hold on for so long.
Once again ticketbleed was on us and try as we might we just couldn't get to the hill with enough guys to make a difference. JDG were horribly accurate with their grenades and covered the hill really well. Our tickets bled fast and at on opportune time when they had manged to kill most of our attackers they snuck over to the eastern flag and contested it. This of course meant we had to start over from our main.
We were forced to work hard to recapture the eastern flag to be able to mount an attack to the hill. It took time but we finally got back "our" flag. Still we couldn't break their hold on the hill and we couldn't even contest the western flag, though not for lack of trying. JDG outplayed us by a large margin and all too soon our tickets were down to zero. JDG 142 - 0 twl
Round 2 - UN_Kharkov
twl - Allies
JDG - Axis
Crap! That was definetly not what we were hoping for. We at least had hoped we could put up a fight and not be crushed like that. Determined not to the let same thing happen again we prepared to rush out of our base. Spawning all over it initially looked as this round would be no better than the first. Just as our planes left the ground we once again saw the JDG paratroopers jumping over the hill to capture it. Dammit! How fast could they be?
This time though we were right on their heels and could contest the flag. This time though we managed to beat them back to capture the hill, but instead they had sneaked a guy over to the western flag to contest it and we lost that one instead. Ticketbleed on us and not a single soldier near the western flag. We fought hard to keep control of the hill but as it became contested many of us had to start over from our own main base.
We did mange to recapture the western flag but lost the hill. Though we had done enough damage that when our reinforcements arrived we could recapture the hill as well and finally get ticketbleed in the direction of JDG. JDG were quick to attack again but this time we had a pretty solid hold of the hill and managed to defend it. Sadly once again JDG managed to capture the western flag and our tickets were bleeding again. But this time we managed to keep hold of the hill while a couple of us retook the western flag.
[user]Tubbe[/user] who bravely defended the western flag had his hands full many times during the rest of the match. Though we tried we never really got a good ticketbleed going and the scores were very even. The flags changed hands a couple of times, but neither team could hold on to two flags for long enough to make it really count. But JDG did manage to hold on for a bit longer than us, even making up for the extra kills we had on them and won this round as well. JDG 48 - 44 twl
UN_Kharkov Total: JDG 190 - 44 twl
After the initial chock during the first round we stepped up our game and managed to make a much tighter round as allies. Though JDG still won the round and we didn't close the ticketgap at all, we still felt a more positive vibe. JDG had secured 1 point and gained a substantial ticketlead coming into the next map. We really hoped we could keep up the initiative we started to show in the second round and perhaps even improve on that. We really wanted to go home with at least one point.
Round 3 - Battle of Ihantala
JDG - Allies
twl - Axis
After a bit of warm-up/waiting for players TK'ing we were about to start. Just before the first live spawn we reminded each other to "spawn at the correct flag and as the designated class". Well a small disaster struck us as we then hear: "Shit!" and see "XXX is no more". Not good as this was our bridge mining guy. Of course JDG chose this time to roll advance with their tank unhindered over the bridge. Doh!
The eastern flag was under heavy attack but we managed to push their first two waves back, keeping the ticketbleed up. Their Katushya pounded the middle flag to keep us down, and we had some real trouble to get rid of it. The tank had a "duel" with our CL, luckily armed with a bazooka. Sadly [user]Flamingo[/user] got on the wrong end of a tank shell, but now our supposed-bridge-miner redeemed himself and blew up the tank.
Now JDG had managed to clear out almost all our soldiers at the eastern flag. A lone engineer tried to keep them at bay but our reinforcements didn't arrive in time and JDG captured the flag. Now they started to advance towards the middle flag as well as sendning one or two guys swimming. Though grenades were flying everywhere and JDG continously managed to make their way down into the trench at the middle flag they didn't manage to contest it.
As the fighting over the middle flag went on they started pouring in over the western bridge trying to get the western flag as well. Still we kept them at bay. Then we couldn't hold on to the middle anymore. Things really started to heat up at the western and second line flags. We started to pull back more soldiers to our main just to be sure not to lose it. When we lost the western flag as well JDG started to pour forward towards the second line as well as pulling up the Katushya for some additional barrage.
We sent a couple of guys to go around to capture the eastern and western flags but we could only contest them. As we kept on pounding our enemies with MG's and PAK's we slowly but surely manged to take the lead. Then finally JDG managed to capture the second line flag and we were down to our main base. In the lead and with little over two minutes left on the clock we felt confident we were going to hold on, but we never got the chance to prove it as the server decided to give us a nice blue screen. Bless you Micro$oft. JDG 24 - 27 twl.
Round 4 - Battle of Ihantala
twl - Allies
JDG - Axis
A quick server change and it was our turn to attack. We really needed a good initial attack and had planned to try something new. Not surprisingly all went awry. All our soldiers got quickly killed. Not good. A on the fly change of objectives all our infantry quickly went for the left bridge. Meeting less resistace there but still we all didn't make it forward. We managed to contest both the western and the middle flags, while our tank were keeping the eastern flag in check.
Suddenly we also had their main base, thanks to our covert-ops [user]febben[/user]. Things were looking really good for us as we surged forward to contest the last two flags. Somehow we just couldn't get close enough to the eastern flag to contest it, and now our tank had been blown up as well. On the other hand we managed to contest the second line flag instead.
Though we captured the second line flag we couldn't defend their main and they managed to recapture it. And still we made no progress on the eastern flag, but on the other hand JDG didn't make any progress at the middle flag either. While the battle between the middle and eastern flags continued we made a few unsuccessful attacks towards their main. Instead they recaptured the second line flag.
Once again things didn't look as promising as it had, and I recollected memories of us being pushed of all flags in previous matches. Luckily this didn't hapen in this match as we managed to hold on to the western and middle flags. The fighting raged on for a couple of minutes. Then we got a break by once again managing to sneak to their main and capture it. JDG were quick to respond but luckily [user]Club Zebra[/user] made a heroic effort taking out all the attackers and he could hold on to the contested flag.
Now we pounded the hell out of the second line flag until we captured it and JDG were down to the only the eastern flag. We positioned the tank and katushya to pound the flag and made a couple of tries to capture it. As those were unsuccessful we instead chose to hold back and kill off the last few tickets. Finally we had them at zero. JDG 0 - 41 twl.
Battle of Ihantala Total: JDG 24 - 68 twl
After managing to hold back JDG for such a long time during round one it felt like we had a slight upper hand on this map, even though the score was very even. Still we didn't feel secure since if our own attack really needed to go well. As our initial attack was quickly beaten back a bit of panic started to spread but our second wave did much better. And when we managed to steal their main it felt like we had the game in the bag. But overconfidence is a real killer and luckily we could win the round though we had to fight hard for every single ticket. We had secured one point, but not by enough tickets to threaten to get the bonus point.
TOTAL SCORE: JDG 214 - 112 twl
That was totally intense. Once again a really close fought game. After that horrible first round on Kharkov we picked ourselves up and started to play better. Even though we lost the bonus point, not that we were even close to getting it, it felt good to go home with 1 point, especially after the beating on Kharkov. We finally managed to get points from JDG in a UN game, which had failed miserably in the first two tries. Also last but not least, by getting one point in this match we managed keep a small window open for i` to win the division and give the final round a of the season a bit more spice.
The final MVP awards from twl this season went to [user]Kane[/user] in JDG and [user]Provider[/user] in twl. [user]Kane[/user] was felt by many to be the most annoying enemy, of many annoying enemies. It was really hard to single out any one player in JDG since they all seemed like twl killing bastards during all four rounds. In twl [user]Provider[/user] got the award for his excellent play on Ihantala and his thankless tankwork on Kharkov.
Well now I promise this will be it, for my writing(for a while at least). twl are finished playing this season. With 2 victories, 4 draws and 0 losses we managed to secure the third spot. Though there is one round left to play there is only a small chance that the results there will influence our placing in the table as. JDG has to win over i` with about 180 tickets, so it's not "undoable", for us to overtake i` in second place.
Thanks to all teams in Division 2. It was a really great season, with many close matches for us. Now it's time for us to sit back and enjoy the show on thursday, unable to influence the score. Bye bye for now.
Bad pirate joke of the day
A pirate walks into a bar with a steering wheel haning from his pants.
Bartender says "You've got a steering wheel hanging from your pants"
Pirate says "Arrr, it's driving me nuts"
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Kharkov - a brief history
The city lies in Ukraine, the earliest record being from 1627. One of the most important industrial cities in the Soviet union and certainly a worthy strategic target for the 153 divisions that germany and it’s allies brought to bear in 1941. Kharkov was taken the first time on Oct 24th, 1941 without much trouble for the Axis 6th and 17th armies.
t wouldn’t be until January 13th 1943 that the Soviet forces would be able to turn their attention to the area, the Stalingrad battle had already been decided and now they faced the Axis 75 defending divisions. The Italian and Hungarian armies were smashed quickly and by the end of January a 200 mile wide hole had been opened along the Axis front and enabling the Soviet forces access to attacking Kharkov’s occupants.
Reinforcements had arrived however to Kharkov, the newly created but still fearsome SS-panzer corps ‘Das Reich’ and ‘Leibstandarte-SS Adolf Hitler’ under Commander Hausser. They brought the tigers with them and while the tigers never proved to be the supreme assault tank it surely made it up in defensive ability. Digging in to the east and northeast of Kharkov, awaiting the Red forces behind the natural defense of the Donetz river.
The Soviet commanders decided to both test the defences and circumvent them by going for crossings south and northward of Kharkov. The ‘Leibstandarte’ repelled the communists easily for the east riverbanks.
On the 9th February Belgorod was taken by the Soviets and a crossing was secured, in response the Axis forces withdrew to Kharkovs city perimeter 10 miles out. Through the 10th to the 14th the germans were fighting a retreating battle, the high command saying they had to hold the city – repeating the Stalingrad mistake. On the 15th the defence barely held a small escape corridor open as the remaining German forces were ordered out by Commander Hausser. The Red forces poured in and seized the city.
The High Command allowed Hausser to live and stay in his command but executed the overall battle commander Lanz for, in their eyes, his inept defence.
This was the first time the German lost the city but not the last, reinforcements (including Haussers troops) to the area led the Germans to counterattack the Soviet forces before they could continue their momentum south and westwards. All through the rest of February and March, the Red forces defended the Ukraine capitol valiantly but in the end had to abandon it on March 18th to defences on the east side of the Donetz, back where they started the year of 1943.
On August 23rd, the German forces had been depleted enough by attrition and transfers to other fronts for the Soviets to retake the city without much opposition. This was the final time Kharkov changed hands and in the process the population had dwindled from 833 000 to 459 300.
Thanks for reading,
InsanityClaus and Lan
