"As the Duke of Wellington might have said of the match from his Liverpool column (presumably minuscule as no one can remember seeing it) 'it was a damn’d close thing'.

Prodigals actually played away at the Griffin (having swopped the corresponding fixture before Christmas to the Albert Club whilst the Griffin was being fitted with multitudinous electronic gadgets) - and suffered the usual result at the hands of the rampant SPW.  Good news to see that Dave was brave enough to venture out after last night's humiliation at Eastlands (only joking, Dave, actually you were unlucky not to win).  Kieran writes:

"Very odd evening.  We were 15 - 14 down at half time and then scored thirty points in the second half while our visitors mustered only 14. 

Very disappointed that my lists of the Jackson and Osmomd brothers proved superfluous and I'm not sure they've done much for my credibility.

Howell was an excellent and much appreciated QM though big Dave thought he had a touch of Mike Dean about him.

Moment of the week was Richard forgetting his beer drinking heritage and, being unable to come up with the term 'mixed', ordering a pint of mild and bitter and duly getting, yes you've guessed it, a pint of mild and a pint of bitter."

Ethel Rodin played the United role in the Stadium of Murk derby going down to the Charabancs of Fire - Damian's take on proceedings:

"An encouraging start to the New Year with a comfortable win.  Sean the Barsteward chose to celebrate the occasion by shutting us out of the big quiz room and forcing us back into the Darts Room where the advantage of warmth was offset by the cacophony of jazz and dancing feet coming directly from the room above.  Roddy duly delivered his forthright views across the bar!"

First reaction (as I sit here at my computer having been unable to savour any of this evening's games) comes from the Fletcher Moss and is a bit damning.  On behalf of the Pigs and the Albert teams Andrew's verdict is:

"Tedious - too clever by half."

No adverse comments from the Griffin but then Howell was on hand to QM and blunt the knives.

Ivor sums up the reaction from the Bards v History Men match:

"We found this a rather hard quiz - which always adds to the tension because a crucial 2 or a lucky 'steal' can swing the game and so it proved.  We note that the Opsimaths used the fiendish device of the Bingo format so that Lady Luck (surely she should be a fate if not a grace or a muse) could be blamed (rather than the setters or the answerers) for our feeble efforts in the first half of the quiz.

Some very good questions but having imbibed the expensive ales of the Metropolitan I have forgotten what they were (I didn’t know the answers either).

Steal of the night was Tim remembering the third volume of Sartres’ works.  Agony of the night was Peter’s 5 minute Rodin-like grimace over the Kern lyric before coming up with Fly Me to the Moon only to see Tony gleefully steal with Come Fly With Me."

Ethel and the Charabancs took a reasonably favourable view as Damian reports:

"The questions went down fairly well although they suited the Charabancs somewhat better than Ethel.  Father M 's intimate knowledge of seedy 60s Mancunian night-clubs proved invaluable to our cause as did his unsurprising expertise on the shape of the Vatican's flag!"

and James confirms:

What do Frederick Fowell, Richard Starkey and Charles Hatcher – all born in the early 1940s – have in common?