|
Val Draper Cup - Semi Finals
KFD beat Bards
KFD storm into the Val Draper final
 Kieran
ponders the rarity of KFD in the Val Draper final
We
have a curious record in the Val Draper cup. WithQuiz records begin
in 1999 and they show that we appeared in nine finals over the first
thirteen years, winning seven of them. Ten cup campaigns since
then and nada, zilch, the biggest, fattest zero imaginable - until
at the eleventh attempt we're finally there again. Our man on
Empire Way will have one last dance, a WithQuiz Last Waltz
and yes, we expect Scorsese to pitch up at the Fletcher Moss to
capture every historic moment on film.
Or
not.
Directorial legends aside, it will be a great end to the season and
a very tough ask, starting eight points down on the Pigs. We warmed
up well tonight for the battle ahead, posting the evening's highest
score (before handicaps) and Barry was right at the forefront, joint
MVP with Martin on five twos.
Ladybarn's very own Symbolist
(R7/Q4)
Bob
left the country a while back at the beginning of the tax year and,
as far as HMRC are concerned, he's currently vacationing in
Valencia. Well yes, that's what they think is the case but we all
know nothing is ever as it seems when Bob is involved. Can't
say too much more, obviously, and especially since Thomas now
carries Charlie's warrant, working in something named 'Compliance'
which somehow sounds innocuous and threatening at the same time.
All the more complicated since dad here has spent pretty much his
entire working life on the opposition bench, keeping the Revenue at
as much of a safe distance as is legally possible. Fear not
readers, I'm sure come autumn Bob will be in his rightful place in
the Living Room of the Griffin having spent the summer doing
....stuff ... and as 'compliant' as he's ever likely to get.
David was in the QM seat and he moved things along at a very decent
pace, just missing the 10pm cut off, achieving which is the mark of
an elite MC. The Bards, shorn of regular players by Easter
holidays, were good opposition and tremendous company during the
game, and after, when conversation turned to great stage
performances we had seen. I was expertly dissed by HH who told me
that he'd never wish to suggest that I was in any way cultured; a
barb I shall wear with great pride - and I didn't even reach for my
gun. Tony also revealed that Philip Glenister once spoke one of his
judgements, word for word, in a TV show, after Tony himself had
refused to be a performing monkey for Granada. Quite right
too; there is a dignity the judiciary must uphold otherwise we may
as well all become American.
A
two week interval to get ourselves in shape for the final. If you
suffer from the absence of quiz teasers during the hiatus then try
this one ...
What do all of the following have in common: Andre Agassi, Charles
Aznavour, Andy Serkis, Cher, Garry Kasparov, Kim (or any) Kardashian,
Alain Prost, Tigran Petrosian and Aram Khachaturian?
Lord Bath knows the answer; it's my riposte to yet another barb,
this time from him but I trust he'll stay quiet for a week or so at
least so you can all keep the little grey cells in working order.
"We warned
you about blurting, Ivor!"
(R4&5/Q18)
Electric Pigs beat Prodigals
The Pigs romp into the Val Draper final all guns blazing
 Anne-Marie
sees a fabulous Prodigal season end in a whimper
The Prods simply couldn't
overcome the disadvantages of a great performance from the Pigs, the
handicap score, and losing the toss and going second.
WithQuiz Plate - Semi Finals
Albert lost to History Men
The History Men win through to the Plate final for the second
year running
 Ivor
adds plenty to his fund of useless information at the Sun
We had a six point
start courtesy of a generous handicap so the scores were really
35-44 had we run with level weights. Nevertheless a good
victory for us especially as we were defeated twice in the league
games against Albert (in the first of these the margin was 20
points). Victory tonight was largely due to a superior steal
rate (8-3). Only 12 questions went unanswered, but seat four
copped for seven of them; four to Eveline and three to me. No
'Paddle of Rebuke' from MOBO necessary tonight as Jeremy and Julian
got 5 twos each in what proved to be a worthy but futile chase.
Needless to say we had an excellent evening in the Sun in September
and learned some new facts (whether we will remember them is another
thing): Fats Domino’s first name; maybe why Milton Obote used his
middle name; German cities for Generation X; a reminder of the
Shakespearean chap who said “let’s kill all the lawyers” (I dare say
he faced suitable justice after the suppression of the rebellion and
probably more severe than 31 months jail).
The most humorous 'wrong' answer (though not actually proffered) was
Eveline’s musings on what the Irish folk song featuring a ship with
a high death rate from measles might be: “Paddy McGinty’s Boat”.
Yemen's
coffee coloured city
(R8/Q2)
|
 Mike
detects the Jesuitical hand of Megson
To
be fair, despite the problem of the handicap, we would have lost
this fixture anyway.
In
a desperate attempt to demonstrate that he is a good father and
husband Ashton had taken his family on holiday, probably to some
activity camp. You know the type of place:
"You'll love it here kids - nothing but quizzes from Cain't See to
Cain't See."
I
deputised for Ashton and it wasn't until the use of the keyword 'feckin'
that I detected the Jesuitical claw of Megson in the setting.
Who could forget that Shakesperean Titan, Dick The Butcher, I ask
you?
We
went a long way behind very quickly and didn't burden ourselves with
too much conferring in a lost cause.
Profiting from the rise of Punk
(R8/Sp1)
Opsimaths beat Ethel Rodin
Rejoice! At last the Opsis win a competitive match and get to a
final
 Mike
was a mere 77 when the Opsis last notched up a victory
Even without the
whacking 9-point handicap advantage we carried into this match
Hilary, Paul, Brian and myself managed to put clear blue water
between ourselves and Ethel. If truth be told the most
influential person on our side was probably me for winning the toss,
since there was a considerable tilt in favour of the team going
first in the first half. The unanswerables broke 7-2 against
the visitors and that was crucial to the outcome.
Chara John very kindly
QMed for us, introducing the paper with the standard speech about
the crap questions being down to the other Charas and the good ones
being his. In truth they all seemed OK to us with Hilary and
Brian especially prospering.
Reaching a final after
the season we've had is a reward for persistence and a determination
to ensure a variety of quizzers saw action under the Opsimaths'
banner during the season. Of course we still miss our quizzer
extraordinaire, Nick, but at last we're beginning to piece together
a new unit which can compete. Roll on 2025/26!
Meanwhile there's a
final against the History Men to navigate before we're done with
this campaign.
Putin' in a bit of practice
(R8/Q5)
 ...
adding a bit of context Brian reports ...
Just to give a bit of context to
last
night's score ...
Discounting the handicaps, and the two Bingo rounds (where, of
course, the questions are randomised and we won 12-10), we scored 9
twos and had only two unanswered. Ethel on the other hand
scored 5 twos and had six unanswered.
So,
even without the handicaps and Bingo rounds, we came out on top
29-26. However I do think Ethel can rightly claim the balance
of the questions was a bit off.
 James
finds a fellow Villa fan lurking in plain sight
Ethel won the
unanswereds battle 7-2, of which 5 had fallen to me (although
admittedly one of those would have been a point if I’d conferred). I
dredged a few other answers (on topics I’d consider esoteric), but
as a team we just had very few opportunities to score.
Occasionally
philately has its values. Christmas stamps are generally of little
value given their abundance - especially 1st or 2nd class stamps
from the 1980s, (when people actually used to send stuff through the
post). But the 1986 2nd class Christmas stamp featuring the
Glastonbury Thorn, unique for changing
its face value from 12 to 13 pence mid-season, delivered
tonight an item of knowledge I would not have acquired elsewhere.
A foggy day in San Francisco
(R4&5/Q8)
Ultimately, however, our 9 point handicap in this game was always a bit of a
joke, and (as I had predicted several weeks ago when I could see
how the formulas were going to play out) we were literally never going to win this match. Given
the maths, there was no jeopardy, so the game was played with
very much a laid-back spirit, and as such did feel like a friendly
night out rather than any kind of competitive encounter.
I bonded with
Opsis newish recruit Paul over Aston Villa; he’d been at Villa Park
on Tuesday night for the exciting victory that wasn’t quite enough vs PSG
-
and we’ll both be at the 6-pointer at the Etihad next Tuesday. City
are a fickle side this season, but for the first time in many years,
the match vs Villa certainly won’t be taken for granted.
Regarding the
handicap, admittedly, ER won the few games we did win by massive
margins, but lost many games by only a point or two. At the end
of the day we were 7th in the league table out of 9 - and several teams well above us,
both in league position and number of wins, had much more favourable
handicaps. Punishing!
On top of this when the
team with a plus 8 point handicap puts out a team stronger than the
typical team that earned
that handicap, and then the questions are largely ‘old school’ which
means the paper was more straightforward for the Opsimaths than many of the other
quizzes we encounter, it was a particularly futile exercise for ER.
The Opsimaths
team that lost to us by 17 in the autumn wasn’t the same one that
tied with us a fortnight ago, or that played us tonight… Just
saying.
The Opsimaths should
now be strong favourites in the Plate final, given their massive
handicap advantage. Having said that I note that during the
season the History Men beat the Opsis by +4 and +11, so I guess the +7 advantage
carried into the final by the Opsis is actually bang on - that is
if the typical Opsis line up is fielded ….
|
B Blackballed
PM
(R4&5/Q5)
Quiz paper set by...
...
The Charabancs of Fire
Average Aggregate score 75.5
A goodly average
aggregate (ignoring the skews afforded by the handicaps). The
Charas are to be thanked for stepping up and providing two papers in
3 weeks to help us through the Cup campaigns.
Hungri Lanka's PM
(R2/Q2)
... and these were
Ivor's views ...
The quiz was well
regarded and if it had been constructed from scratch in a week it
did not look like it (had we been setting there would have been “In
the news this week…” style questions). The caveat that surnames were
required unless indicated did not at all lead us to suspect that
there would in fact be an entire round where ONLY first names were
required. We also appreciated the “old” questions. Ashton (not
playing tonight) has previously commented that such questions will
not attract the millennials to our quiz but we love to be reminded
of our sixties and seventies schooldays. Not that O-level geography
could be precisely recalled (total failure to remember the correct
Ouse) but the Irish mountain with the impossible spelling that had
been resting unsaid and unused for 50 years came immediately to
mind.
QotW must be the tie
breaker helpline waiting times. Just the “Express your answer in
years” tells you all you need to know about HMRC.
"Now just sit
still, Mummy!"
(R7/Q1)
... and James
adds ...
In some ways,
the most interesting of Charas’ quizzes this year, and the range of
questions, themes and subject matter were pretty good. Given that
they only had a week to put it together, it was a more than decent
effort.
But it wasn’t
the type of quiz where a large handicap was ever going to be clawed
back. And it was also not a quiz in which to go second. Maybe with a
little more time the balance could have been optimised.
... finally
Mike O'B adds his verdict ...
The overall score would indicate that the quiz was tough but
reasonable and The Charas did well to put it together at such short
notice.
"Well done if
you got that at home!"
(R1/Q1)
Question of
the Week
This week Ivor and the History Men plump (unusually) for the
evening's Tiebreaker question ...
According to the National Audit Office what was the total cumulative
time spent by HM Revenue and Customs telephone customers on hold
waiting to have their tax queries answered in the year 2022/2023?
(express
your answer in years)
For the answer to this and all the week's other questions click
here.
James'
Christmas stamp fact
(R7/Q7)
... and also
Knocked Out United
Next week there are
no matches, but the following Wednesday (April 30th) we stage the
finals of the Val Draper Cup and the WithQuiz Plate. As is the
tradition the paper for these finals will be set by 'Knocked Out
United' (i.e. the teams no longer competing in either of the cup
competitions). Since they've shouldered the burden of setting
twice already for the cup competitions the Charabancs are exempt
from these duties. The team that submits the best round of the
'Knocked Out United' paper (as judged by the 4 finalists) will
receive a prize at the end of the season evening.
This year Anne-Marie from
The Prodigals will be compiling the paper so by Friday next week
(25/4) AT
THE LATEST she needs the following teams:
Bards, Prodigals,
Ethel Rodin and Albert
to each send
her 2 rounds of questions (any format - pairs, themes, run-ons,
etc). Anne-Marie's email address is:
annemarie.glennon@gmail.com
"Ethel's Out - Ain't that a
shame!"
(R3/Q7)
|
