The EFAF Cup schedule allows little time for arrangements to be made once the play off stages are reached and with no sponsorship the Brits had to fall back on a 20 hour plus bus journey to get them to the game. This travelling commitment and NFLE commitments also meant that they went with a weakened squad - something that was unavoidable but inevitably damaged their chances of success against one of Europe's top 5 teams.

The Raiders on the other hand are all locally based in the Tirol including their 6 imports - 3 Americans and 3 dual passport North Americans - add to that Benjamin Deiplinger who was with the Frankfurt Galaxy and Florian Grein (arguably one of the best European National prospects around) and the Brits had a mountain to climb. Just to make matters worse Mario Rinner the Raiders star linebacker had just been cut from the NFLEurope and came back to lead the team in tackles.

The O's took the opening kick off and went to work confidently with Roland Williams running the ball and Stuart Franklin picking up yardage on short passes.the Raiders however stopped the drive and then Head Coach Geoff Buffum who also plays QB for the Raiders took over. With 5mins 50 remaining in the first quarter he finished a 10 play drive that covered 75yds with a 33yd pass to WR Chris Rosier (Former Cincinatti Bengals and Buffalo Bills) to open a lead they would not surrender. Schnellreider added the PAT and the Raiders led 7-0.

After the next O's possession the Raiders return put them on the Londoners 10yd line - RB Florian Grein only needed one play to add to the scoring and Schnellreider duly made it 14-0 with the kick.

The Raiders had the ball again before the quarter ended and again a one play drive saw Chris Rosier haul in his second TD of the day from 19yds out. Schnellreider again kicked the point and the Raiders led 21-0 as the teams ended the quarter.

Rosier was having a great day personally and added to his MVP performance with an interception early in the second quarter. Buffum then engineered a 5 play drive that covered 46yds which ended in WR Aaron David making a 28yd scoring reception. Schnellreider kicked again and the Raiders were 28-0 ahead with 10.33 remaining in the half.

The O's continued to battle but could not break down a fast Raider Defense that responded to everything the Brits threw at them. the next Raider drive was time consuming swallowing over 5 minutes of time a Florian Grein went to work on the ground. It was the young austrian prospect, currently serving his national service in the Austrian Army, who burst into the endzone from 19yds out to give Schnellreider a further kicking opportunity and a 35-0 Raiders lead.

The O's gave the Austrians one final possesion in the first period and the home team spurred on by 2,000 supporters took it to the house again as WR David made his second TD catch from Buffum to send the Raiders in 42-0 in the lead at the half following the Schnellreider kick.

The second half saw the Raiders starters on the field for one final 6 play drive that covered 49yds. Buffum through his 5th TD on a near perfect day before taking himself out of the game - this time he hit the dependable Benjamin Deiplinger from 17yds out. Schnellreider kicked the point and the Raiders led 49-0.

Many teams would have crumbled under such pressure but to their credit the O's kept fighting and took the chance to show that with the imports and star Austrians removed they could move the ball on the Raiders and stop their back up players from scoring. The Raiders completed no further passes and failed to score again.

Stuart Franklin began to make good use of Receivers Clive Palumbo and Junior Price and it was Price who opened the visitors account in the 4th quarter. The Raiders fumbled a punt on their own 5yd line and one quick pass from Franklin to Price saw the O's score. Matt Coppinger ran in the extra 2 points on a well executed fake kick and the score stood at 49-8.

After a Raider punt the O's then embarked on their most impressive drive - with 9 plays covering 67yds to Collis Seale-McConnie's 6yd run for 6 points. Coppinger was again involved in the conversion catching a 2 point pass play to round out the score at 49-16.

The Raiders now host the Knights in Innsbruck in 3 weeks time - Friday 25th 19-30 live on TW1 and available to watch via the internet. The Knights will be the clear under-dog and Head Coach Steve Rains commented "We came to Innsbruck to scout the opponent for the final what we saw was that this Raiders team is very impressive and in my view warrant their #5 ranking in Europe. Credit to the O's against the odds they kept battling and 10 tackles credited to "Team" shows how their D swarmed to the ball.. We have nothing to lose coming into the Final - nobody expected us to be here - we will enjoy it and the pressure is on them. We have three weeks to prepare but will concentrate on our BSL game with Ipswich until next week."