2011 Results and Recap

It's that time of the year again, when Quidditch fans all around the British Isles and the world as a whole stop and turn their attention to the opening fixtures of the year's British and Irish Quidditch League. Saturday morning Australian time, the 2011 champion Tutshill Tornados will take on the Wigtown Wanderers at Bodmin Moor to open the new season. The atmosphere of anxious anticipation for season 2012 has been electric, thanks in no small part to the drama and excitement of 2011's business end.

With the notable exception of the stunning undefeated seven match run by the Ballycastle bats to open the season, most of 2011 followed the predicted formula, with teams such as the Wasps, United, Magpies and Tornados clearly dominating. As June approached the Bats faltered, losing their inspirational leader Ajax Shettigar to injury, then subsequently losing three of their last five matches as the realisation that they must handle the pressure of fighting for the League Cup began to press its weight. The other four front-runners all ended the season with a run of four straight emphatic wins and the competition looked to be running to formula. But things started to change when the finals hit.

The first shock came when a brilliant snitch catch from Begonia Parkin just 35 minutes into the game saw the Wanderers upset Puddlemere United 260-200.

The Magpies and Tornados encounter was tight but all too short, rookie Seeker Alison Abberley catching the snitch for the Magpies to hand them a 170 point win. The Bats Chasers returned to form with a formidable attacking display that saw them run over a hundred goals past the hapless Falcons. But question marks remained. The usually unfancied Falmouth attack managed 54 goals and Bats replacement Seeker Elodie Griffiths continued to look nervy and out of place in the pressure-cooker of finals time, failing to catch the snitch. The Wasps meanwhile, were deadly, devastating the Arrows.

The Semi Finals had a feeling of anti-climax with a pair of stunning snitch snatches from Aurora Muntz and Alison Abberley ending both matches within an hour. The Tornados looked scratchy and in fact trailed by 10 points before Muntz saved their blushes. The Magpies-Puddlemere match was the shortest of the entire season, lasting a mere fourteen minutes. Both teams showed stunning Chaser prowess and went goal for goal. But with the score sitting at 40-40 and the viewing public settling in for hours of classic Quidditch, Muntz swooped from above, plummeting dramatically to grab the snitch inches from the ground and end the horribly unlucky Puddlemere's season.

If the week before had been a disappointment, the Preliminary Finals made up for it and then some.  There was a feeling before the Bats-Magpies match that it would last a more than good length due to both team's respectively unconvincing rookie Seekers Elodie Griffiths and Alison Abberley. But no-one could have predicted a match so long it threatened to reschedule the Grand Final. Even more astonishing was how  consistently high the quality of Quidditch and how close the score-line remained. It took until early Tuesday morning, the fifty seventh hour, for the Saturday night match to end. In all that time no team had led by more than 30 goals, but the inexperienced Bats just couldn't stay with Montrose, fading with each passing hour. The Magpies looked safe for victory as of Monday evening, but it took Abberley a further nine hours to catch the snitch and seal a 460 point win.

This marathon was not the match that everyone will remember forever though. The second spot in the Grand Final was fought for by standout competition favourites Wimbourne Wasps and the scratchy but at their best, ultra-impressive Tutshill Tornados. The match lasted for seventeen hours and each second of it was captivating, with Quidditch of the quality rarely seen in the BIQL's four century history. The lead changed hands no fewer then twenty-three times in the first five hours alone. The Tornados re-invented their game, playing with an absurd complexity and skill that would on any other day ground the opposition into the dust. Such was the equally hitherto unmatched quality of the Wasps performance though, that Tutshill were only able to stay level or slightly in front, never taking total control of the match.

As the sun rose on Monday morning there was disaster for Tornados fans, with Seeker Aurora Muntz put in hospital with thirty-three broken bones after a brutal tandem Beater assault from Erasmus Oddpick and Gaius Nutt and a subsequently fifty foot fall. With the margin having never reached more than 70 points in either direction, this Seeker incapacitation was a devastating blow. The blow only served to inspire the Tornados further however and they embarked on two hours of intense Chaser interplay that left Wimbourne behind.  With the lead at 150 points and every Quidditch fan's nail bitten down to the finger, retiring Wasps Seeker Chroniculus Furmage avoided two Bludgers, a goal post and an irate fan's jinx to sweep along the edge of the grandstands and catch the snitch in a most spectacular fashion. But less than two seconds earlier, Tornados Keeper Lucian Stainwright, having darted out of goal by himself, scored the first and only Keeper goal of the season to increase the final lead to 160. As the Wasps celebrated what they thought was a tying catch, the Tornados realised that by a single goal they had sprung the ultimate upset and reached the Grand Final.

On Sunday July 3 2011, the Montrose Magpies faced the Tutshill Tornados in the British and Irish Quidditch League Grand Final. They had met twice previously in 2011. The Tornados won a thriller, 560-530, back in Round 4. The Magpies though had won just three weeks earlier in the Qualifying Final. This fact, as well as the Tornados' inconsistent form, Aurora Muntz's potential absence through injury and the feeling that they had possibly played their Grand Final the week before in beating the Wasps meant that the Magpies came in as the bookies' favourite. The reality was very different however. Muntz was a confirmed started on the Sunday morning of the game. Montrose, fatigued from their three day marathon the weekend before were flat and disappointing. One could not help but feel a sense of anticlimax in the short and relatively uncompetitive Grand Final, but this was inevitable after the dizzying dramatic heights scaled the previous week. Tutshill dominated in every facet and quickly ran out to a 250-50 lead. But there was one final twist yet. The Magpies rallied and, although still looking the inferior team, at least got the margin back under 150 temporarily. It was right at this moment, with the Tornados leading 310-170, that Aurora Muntz and Alison Abberley were seen to swoop dramatically downfield towards the snitch. It was anybody's game at that exact juncture and so the previously pained Magpies fans held one last glimmer of hope. But they needn't have taken their head from their hands. Abberley was no match for the immeasurably more experienced Muntz who comfortably caught the snitch and won the League Cup for her team.




2011 League Standings

Pos.	Team	P	W	L	T	B	Points
1	Wimbourne Wasps	12	10	1	1	1	23
2	Ballycastle Bats	12	9	3	0	1	20
3	Puddlemere United	12	8	3	1	1	19
4	Montrose Magpies	12	8	4	0	1	18
5	Tutshill Tornados	12	8	4	0	1	18
6	Wigtown Wanderers	12	6	6	0	1	14
7	Falmouth Falcons	12	6	6	0	1	14
8	Appleby Arrows	12	5	7	0	1	12
9	Holyhead Harpies	12	5	7	0	1	12
10	Pride Of Portree	12	5	7	0	1	12
11	Kenmare Kestrels	12	3	9	0	1	8
12	Caerphilly Catapults	12	2	10	0	1	6
13	Chudley Cannons	12	2	10	0	1	6

Qualifying Finals

4. Montrose Magpies - 330* DEFEATED 5. Tutshill Tornados - 160

3. Puddlemere United - 200 LOST TO 6. Wigtown Wanderers - 260*

2. Ballycastle Bats - 1050 DEFEATED 7. Falmouth Falcons - 690*

1. Wimbourne Wasps - 460* DEFEATED 8. Appleby Arrows - 30

Semi Finals

5. Tutshill Tornados - 290* DEFEATED 6. Wigtown Wanderers - 150

3. Puddlemere United - 40 LOST TO 4. Montrose Magpies - 190*

Preliminary Finals

2. Ballycastle Bats - 2660 LOST TO 4. Montrose Magpies - 3110*

1. Wimbourne Wasps - 1140* LOST TO 5. Tutshill Tornados - 1150

GRAND FINAL

4. Montrose Magpies - 170 LOST TO 5. Tutshill Tornados - 460*

2011 Champions: TUTSHILL TORNADOS