Hey all! I am SO new at this, and I need a little advice....

Doing a football field/football cake for a friend (she's letting me practice on her!) and I am super nervous about how heavy this football has become. It looks AMAZING: rice krispies, covered in candy coating, then covered in fondant. Did the paper towel method, and it looks real!

But again, it's gotten HEAVY! I plan on making the 'field' out of two, 2-layer chocolate cake (2 9x13s side by side) (from scratch), and then a 6-inch round on top, with the football on top of that, to make it look like the football is "bursting" out of the cake. I'm just so afraid that once I put the football on top, the whole thing will collapse. I don't have any dowels in the football, but I was thinking of cutting a hole in the round and putting dowels in the 9x13 underneath to support the ball. Also thinking of somehow putting a rice krispie "block" to make the ball stay at an angle, but not really sure how it will pan out.......any advice or suggestions?????? I don't want to have to post this in cake disasters!! lol

You could also but a board under the ball and on top of the dowels. Maybe you could sharpen a center dowel shorter than the football and stick it on that from the bottom. That way you don't have to stick one through the top of you finished football and have to fix the hole. I don't know if that helps or not???