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Week 17 – San Francisco 49ers (6-9) @ Arizona Cardinals (10-5)

Strengths
- Garcia and Owens still.
- Effective runners, and a decent line blocking for them.
- With Jeff Ulbrich's return from injury, a better-than-decent linebacker corps.

Weaknesses
- Very patchy secondary.

Game Plan
The Week 13 game at Corporate Shill Stadium was characterised by Marcel Shipp doing an awful lot of work for very little reward, and 69er cornerback Jason Webster watching assorted wide receivers leaving him in the dust. More of the same would suit me fine, thanks.

We've been haemorrhaging yards against the run over the past month or so, and the two-headed Barlow/Hearst beast is perfectly capable of continuing that trend. But the main concern, as ever, is Owens - Jed Bowden did a pretty good job of keeping him quiet in the first game, but will undoubtedly need help to achieve something similar this time around.

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So. Last day of the regular season, and the last game of the season at Sun Devil unless something improbable happens in the playoffs. The maths are simple - a win today, and we're the fifth seeds on our way to Green Bay for the wildcard round. A loss and Seattle take the fifth seed, and it's a trip to the NFC East champion Pontomac Drainage Basin Indigenous-Persons. Pick your poison.

I momentarily consider resting some starters, but in the interests of maintaining what shaky momentum we have - and in the interests of rewarding a pretty long-suffering set of fans - I decide to go with a full-strength team, at least to start with. And the lads reward me by leaping out to a ten-point lead in the first quarter through Thingamajig and Johnno, our offence once again coming mostly through the air.

Not letting themselves get rattled by the early setbacks, the Niners come out on the ensuing drive with a couple of good runs, but on a 2nd and 2 Levar Fisher, in the midst of a breakout season, comes off the edge at about Warp Nine and hammers the ball loose along with several of Jeff Garcia's teeth. Defensive tackle Paul Grasmanis scoops up the rock and takes off for the endzone like a gazelle. An overweight gazelle, admittedly. Alright, an overweight gazelle with no legs.

Anyhow, we translate the 1st down at the 34 to three more points, and at the end of the first quarter it's SF 0-13 ARI

Just when we think this is in danger of turning into as big a blowout as the game at Formerly Known As Candlestick, though, back come San Francisco. Twice we get them to The Official Down And Distance Of The Arizona Cardinals, twice they get themselves out of trouble with big plays, to tight end Eric Johnson and to Owens. It takes Kevin Barlow two goes to get over from the 1, but get over he does and our lead is cut to 6.

Still, I'm not going to get all that worried 'till the 49ers show they can, you know, stop our offence. At all. Ever. Jason Webber, who's definitely gotten himself onto my Christmas card list, gets no help deep and so once Bryant Johnson's blown past him like he's not there, there's just 60 yards of empty space between Johnno and the endzone. Five minutes to halftime, SF 7-20 ARI

And we're not done yet. No-Mark pretty much single-handedly ends the ensuing drive with a sack on second down then clawing the ball away from Tai Streets on 3rd, and to cap the half off Jeff Blake, who's having just the sort of confidence-boosting performance the doctor ordered on the eve of the playoffs, goes 6 out of 7 for 73 yards, the last six of those to Anquan Boldin to take us to the break at SF 7-27 ARI

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The second half begins as the first ended - with a clinical, well-executed drive that San Francisco never so much as look like stopping. 7 runs, 4 passes, 63 yards, 6 minutes. Travis Minor gets the nod near the goal-line, wriggling over from 8 yards out to put the game pretty much beyond the Niners' reach.

"Pretty much beyond their reach" becomes "absolutely beyond their reach" on the ensuing possession when, after a long, time-consuming drive that ends when Levar Fisher, who seems to be involved in everything good we're doing on defence at the moment, rips the ball out of Kevan Barlow's hands as the halfback tries to convert a 2nd and goal from the 3.

San Francisco eventally manage a couple of very late scores once every player I give a toss about has been taken off the field, but it's not really been a contest since the middle of the second quarter. Final score SF 21-35 ARI,  and the fans at Sun Devil rise to acclaim a remarkable year for the team - our final season record a fairly bleedin' impressive 11-5.

Post-season here we come!

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(c) daniel roe 2004