By the very nature of Warhammer some units are less expensive than others. In most cases the cheaper units are worse than the sxpensive units and that is the right way to do things. Unfortunately that makes it hard for the player with the less expensive units to win combats straight up. So if both players push their armies at each other the player with the more expensive units should win when the units bump into each other. This is a problem for many armies. Fortunately there are many solutions to this problem.
The easiest solution is to have more blocks than the opponent. This will allow the opponent to have more placements at set up and more blocks of troops so they can flank the opponent somewhere. If both players spend roughly 1000pts on troops the lizardmen player can get 3 blocks of 18 saurus with spear and a dwarf player can get 5 blocks of 20 warriors with shields (to say nothing of the orc player getting 8 blocks of 20 orcs with extra choppa). This should allow a player to put a cheap unit in front of the opponents expensive unit and still have extra units flanking around.
Of course terrain and smaller differences in points might make this harder to do. The same result can still be optained by using a unit and placing it at an angle in front of one of the opponents better blocks. In order to do this that unit has to hold and not be flanked. If this works then any unit charging the front of the angled unit can be flanked.
With these tactics any player should be able to handle better units most of the time.