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WITHQUIZ The Withington Pub Quiz League QUIZBIZ 1st April 2015 |
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| WQ Archive | Comments | Question papers | |||
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WITHQUIZ The Withington Pub Quiz League QUIZBIZ 1st April 2015 |
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| WQ Archive | Comments | Question papers | |||
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The Bards win by 14 points - but The Opsimaths' 19 point victory ensures they stay on top and lift the League crown |
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The League Season - Summary |
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It was a wafer thin league triumph for The Opsimaths - level on points with the Bards, but with a season's accumulation of winning margins just 14 points greater than their ultimate rivals. The real story of the season, however, has been the emergence of two further teams (Albert and Ethel Rodin) to add to the three from last year (The Bards, The Opsimaths and Dunkin' Dönitz) that have proved themselves likely contenders for the league trophy. Since 2011 we have moved from one team enjoying total domination of the competition for over a decade (with the result that the league title was sometimes determined as early as January), to the point where five teams were in contention right up to the final round of matches. Nothing speaks more eloquently of the gathering strength of our competition. This week's plaudits for The Opsimaths are enhanced by the knowledge that there will be plenty of teams capable of knocking them off their perch come October! |
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Results & Match Reports |
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Compulsory Meat Raffle lost to The Bards of Didsbury at the Cricket Club - but did so with a score sufficient to prevent the home team making up any ground on the Opsimaths in the overall struggle at the top of the table. In the event The Bards would have needed to win by 28 points or more to secure the crown but actually won by a 14 point margin. At the end of the match Tony and myself spoke over the phone and he graciously offered his congratulations to the Opsimaths, but also to Rachael and the rest of CMR who had put up a strong showing to keep his team in check. Tony sums up with these words.... "Congratulations to the Opsimaths on a great season and a splendid result. I am disappointed the Charas didn't make more of a fight of it, but then not all quizzes suit all teams. I had hoped they might have been invigorated with some Père Megson Toughening. We knew that we had to score well to stand any chance of putting one over the Opsimaths. In each round we tended to forge ahead (hardly surprising as the Students could only field a team of three with their number one position always being a conferred effort), only to have Rachael come up with a two pointer to knock us back. It is fair to say that the season ended for us on a high after a very pleasant evening quizzing followed by an hour or so discussing the St Nazaire Raid (Eric's skipper had commanded the Cambeltown in the raid) only to find the students probably knew more about the raid than we did. All Eric and I could contribute was that both of us knew people who took part, won gallantry medals and survived."
Dunkin' Dönitz
ended their league season with a fittingly close run victory over the
Albert team. 'Fittingly' because Albert have been strong
contenders throughout "We took the lead for the first time in the evening on the first question of the last round and ended up winning by a margin which didn't at all reflect the nature of the contest in which the Albert had been comfortably ahead for the majority of the match. We've had two incredibly tough games against them this season with honours even at a victory apiece. Through gritted teeth, I have to admit that the league is better for having four or five teams in with a realistic chance of winning the title right up to the closing weeks of the season than it was in the days when we seemed to win it at a canter every year. Nothing will ever beat the one point defeat / one point victory of SPW v Bards and Opsis v Pigs from 2011 (well, OK, Aguerrrrooooooo beats it by a million miles) but this has been a great season. Congratulations to The Opsimaths on retaining the title - we're still not going away though!
After the start we had to this season and some of the monumental self-inflicted wounds early on we have to be pleased with third, just one point behind the champions, but it's a strange feeling having to take comfort from that. Onwards to the cup, it's all we have to play for this season but even that is more than either of our football teams." ...whilst Mike O'B offers these thoughts on behalf of the Albert team.... "Congratulations from the Albert on the Opsimaths' victory in what has been the most exciting season for a long time. It isn't always appreciated how tough this league is. We dropped points to Meat Raffle and the Pigs so even teams which appear on paper to be doing badly have had a significant role to play. The paddle thanks the website for its kind thoughts and has called a team meeting to emphasise how displeased it is with our failings. Next season it is proposing to offer us a choice between pain or humiliation."
The History Men lost to Ethel Rodin by 14 points in the Red Lion. Ethel have proved this year to be stayers in the league race after a number of years in which they have shone mercurially for a while yet faded by the season's end. If you asked the Opsimaths what their most surprising result had been this season then their 17-point victory at the White Swan a fortnight ago would be well up there. This was the match we feared most in the run in yet a full strength Rodin team collapsed in the face of the CMR paper set that evening. James sends his report on last night's match.... "With Ivor in New York, Tim rose to the occasion and was a strong candidate for QM of the year - and judging by his performance, I suspect one or two of his junior doctors over the years might have struggled with his witheringly dry rebukes!
.... and so to the final, and crucial, league match of this season in which The Opsimaths beat The Charabancs of Fire by a decisive 19 point margin. For the Charas it was a bit like the Scotland v Gibraltar footie match earlier in the week when a Rock met a Hard Place - the Charas nobly played the part of the Rock! The Opsimaths were missing Clare, our University Challenge producer star (off shooting students I believe), and myself (in the QM chair), so it was Nick, Howell, Brian and Hilary who waged the final battle so successfully. Buoyed up by frantic messages of good luck from our star player of last season, Paddy, who is holed up in the Great Wen doing some meeja stuff, we cruised to an 11 point lead by the end of Round 2, and a 14 point lead by the close of Round 5. Even so we were fearful of news from Didsbury East of a great bardic student slaughter the like of which had not been seen these last 5 years since Nick Clegg served up a bit of a massacre over their fees in 2010. Not so, as it turned out, as I spoke to Tony at the end and he confirmed a victory for his Bards but not such a victory as might snatch the title. Smiles all round and some very pleasant comments from the Charas. It had been a long evening's quizzing and there was only just enough time for a celebratory pint before the bar staff had to turn us out into the wild weather. Obviously The Opsimaths have grown stronger and more adept at quizzing these last 5 years as we have lifted 3 league titles (when the previous thirty or so years yielded diddly squat). The key has been our squad system. With 6 players regularly turning out we have been able to weather the weeks when the Etihad called or University Challenge was filming late, without lowering our standard significantly. Six in the squad is about the right number. More would mean someone who would lose interest due to lack of match practice and 5 would have exposed our flanks a little too much in vital encounters. We will be ready to fight for our crown next season but fully expect a doughty struggle with the other four top teams from this campaign, and probably a few more as the league carries on gathering strength. Damian saw things from a slightly different perspective. Here's his take.... "The Charas ended the season as they began....with a drubbing which seems par for the course for us these days. Not even Father M's visits to all those French shrines this past fortnight had any beneficial effect. Yours Truly is beginning to suspect that he doesn't have much street cred with the Big Quizsetter in the Sky anymore. Our esteemed opponents, fighting for every point they could get to finish top of the league begged us to lose to them by a large margin. Now, believe it or not, there are still one or two limits to what we'll do for a free round of booze so we agreed to concede defeat by nothing more than a mere 19 points! Dammit, we still have our pride you know! However, it was apparently just enough to seal a memorable victory for the opposition - so well done and congratulations to 2015 League Champions: The Opsimaths! Yay!!!" |
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Quiz Paper Verdict |
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This week the paper was set by The Men They Couldn't Hang. Let Kieran be the first to comment....
" I had a gripe about the Sam's/Tom's Chop House 50/50 for the Lowry question which of course we guessed wrong but that was the only fault we could find with a superbly enjoyable way to end the league season." ....and so to James.... "We enjoyed the paper - more than the Hymen did, anyway. The answer of the night was to the Orwellian stick-wiggling question. Our answer of 'sex' was surely a suitably dystopian interpretation of the question." ....and Damian.... "Tonight's paper was the usual well crafted and thoughtful affair we have now come to expect from the Hangmen. It didn't really suit us, but then not much seems to do these days, but we recognised and appreciated its quality. We particularly enjoyed the 'Pick Your Choice Of Car' Rounds 4 and 5 and, as ever, the good humoured atmosphere was as fun filled as ever. In fact, we can't really think of any other quiz league in the entire universe we would rather come (nearly) bottom of! We couldn't think of a QotW but we were all pretty unanimous in voting for Rounds 4 & 5 as Rounds of the Week!" ....and Anne-Marie....
"Gosh that was a long night. As usual a very clever quiz from
TMTCH, but I wish we had started the quiz a few ....and Mike O'B.... "Dave spends so long on his quizzes, and they are so carefully constructed, that it seems a pity to spoil them by giving answers. It was a good competitive match and we led for most of it until we ran out of steam engines and tanks, and airplanes and cars for that matter. I would love to have Dave's energy for setting quizzes but alas it will never happen." ....and Tony.... "The quiz was thoroughly enjoyable. We all loved the Graham 'Wily' Wiggins rounds. It was novel to have all the pictures (neatly folded) dumped on the table before the round started but no-one peeked." Finally from the QM's chair at the joyous Albert Club I can confirm that the Opsimaths loved this paper. I have waxed lyrical in the past over TMTCH papers so I'll refrain this time for fear of overdoing it and tarnishing Dave's reputation. I think it was Chara John who commented somewhere down the line that 'We must be getting to the end of Dave's Airfix kits soon.' P.S. I don't know about the rest of you but at the Albert Club our paper didn't include the sheet with spare questions. Therefore I only saw them when Dave emailed them to me to put up on the website. I urge you to test yourself against Spare question number 5 right at the end. Cracking stuff!! |
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The Question of the Week |
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....and as it is the end of the league season I'm going to cheat and add a runner up this week from the same Round 6 - this time Question 4:
For the answer to this and all the week's questions click here. |
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Chatterbox |
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A one week break now for Easter with the Val Draper Cup matches kicking off on April 15th. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Finally could I ask anyone who regularly accesses this site and enjoys its content - and is not a regular WithQuizzer - to get in touch. Something like 4 hours a week goes into updating the site with reports, comments and question papers and I know we have quite a wide audience (last year the Home page got well over a million hits). Do let me know (mikebath@pfsl.org.uk) what you like, what you don't like and anything you'd like to see included in the future. In particular it would be good to hear from anyone in other quiz leagues/competitions to hear how our papers compare with the ones you are confronted with elsewhere. Many thanks.
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The
Electric Pigs lost to The Prodigals in the only match of the
evening that didn't have a bearing on the top of the table tussle.
the campaign and were for many weeks my own tip for the top.
Presumably now the title has been decided, Mike's 'Paddle of Rebuke'
will be wielded in earnest to prepare the troops for the coming cup
competitions. Kieran, skipper of the team that just
couldn't stop winning the league a few short years ago, records his
feelings about last night's match but also about the season as a
whole....
On
the way home Barry pointed out a quirk. The papers The Bards have
set this season have had aggregates of 56 and 54 while The Opsimaths' papers
have yielded 81 and 86. So it has been much easier for The Bards to
rack up points when the Opsimaths have been sitting out as setters than
it has been for The Opsimaths when the Bards were setting. The Bards
have increased their 'score difference' tally by 25 while playing on The
Opsimaths papers while the Opsis have only gained a 13 point increase
when The Bards were the setters. Maybe if it ever gets this tight
again the method for deciding the winner when teams are tied on points
needs some finessing.
Dave
Barras from The Men QM'd while Bob was globetrotting to Catalunya (I swear the
man is a tax exile). Dave did full justice to unquestionably the best
paper of the season. TMTCH yet again have proved themselves the best setters in
the league. A paper full of interest and answers maybe just out of reach which
demanded a lot of teamwork. Martin saying something which would spark an
idea with Barry which David could then mould into the correct answer. One of
those evenings when we added up to way more than the sum of our parts. If only
we'd had a few more of those this season. The 'unanswereds' broke 6-4
against us which is nothing to moan about and Albert won on twos, 11-8 - but we
cleaned up on 'steals' 12-7 which is where we won the game. There were a few
forty yard top corner screamers as well. David proving yet again that he has no
equal amongst the Donuts when it comes to identifying military hardware by
authoritatively naming the Scout light tank, and Barry in the Barbour jacket
opting for ash (thank God) from the myriad trees with leaves and buds. 
hours earlier to really appreciate the subtleties of the questions."
So
many candidates it seems a pity to have to choose just one but my own vote as
the most pleasurable for the QM to read out goes to Round 6 Question 2: