Withington Pub Quiz League - quizbiz 18/11/15

Good wins for The Opsimaths, The Bards and The Pigs; The Men and The Charas fight to a standstill in the season's second tied result; The History Men get the better of Dunkin' Dönitz

Results & Match Reports

The Men They Couldn't Hang tied with The Charabancs of Fire at the Parrs Wood Hotel. Graham surfaces with some enigmatic comments....

"The Hangers season (resuming after the international break) continues on the up as we achieved a 30-30 tie with the Charas at the Stadium of Light (as The Parrs Wood is now known to us). It was a tightly fought quizathon that slightly overran the allotted timespan despite being admirably QM'd by Gilly. Nevertheless a thoroughly entertaining evening which I'm sure our new recruit Adrian was thoroughly perplexed/bemused/enamoured by. He may well thought 'Why am I doing this on a Wednesday night?'. The Shrimps' quiz may well have provided him with the answer. Or not."

...whilst his captain, Dave reports....

"Nip and tuck all evening, with Rachael's Dad helping us go from 3 points behind to 3 points in front. Those Charas were simply not funky enough! Debutant Adrian came good with a 2 pointer but the surprise of the night was Steve being the only player who knew the full title of Dr Strangelove. He is also the only player who wasn't born when the film was made.

QotW? Probably Ticket to Ride. Adrian suggested it as a joke answer but the more we thought about it the more we liked it. But, of course, it would be that the Charas came up with it eventually after an eternal confer and denied us the steal!"

and finally Damian rounds up....

"Our first visit to the newly refurbished Parrswood resulted in our first draw of the season. Once again, our (slight) initial lead was gradually whittled away, although we just about managed to prevent it disappearing into the red on this occasion. This was a nail-biter of a quiz with honours more or less even from start to finish but it could have resulted in a victory for us if only Yours Truly (supposedly knowledgeable about folk who wear a crown for a living) had managed to recall that William III was the nephew of his predecessor as well as his son-in-law - and if only we had decided to go with my (admittedly vague) suggestion of 'diamonds' in question 4 of the 'Recent Science' round instead of opting for a jokey response. But that was the way the quiz cookie crumbled until Hanger Dave decided to discard his team's carefully planned strategy of never going for a two if they can help it by promptly going for a two on the last question of the night to secure a well-deserved draw. They said we couldn't hang 'em and by golly they were right. Bravo!"

The Opsimaths beat Albert at the Albert Club. A significant result at the top of the table with both teams very much in the hunt for honours this season. Mike O'Brien sums up....

"This would have been a good toss to win and go first - but we didn't. What really did for us was Round 5. Our knowledge of this level of science just wasn't up to it and we scored nil points."

The Electric Pigs beat Ethel Rodin at the Fletcher Moss lifting themselves right back into the title race - and taking the shine off Ethel's tremendous early season run. Without taking anything away from the Pigs' performance, James thinks the toss was rather crucial with a paper that favoured the side going first....

"Lost on the toss again. I have no doubt whatsoever that Ethel would have won on the call of tails.

Despite an early lead we were then hammered with 8 unanswereds to the Pigs' 3 and the lead was slowly clawed back.

The last round handed it to the Pigs with a series of straightforward 2 pointers. For the crucial final question (Pigs one behind at that point) to then be one my 11 year old would have got, is somewhat frustrating. You don't mind losing to some inspired piece of knowledge, but 'Monopoly' for 2 points at the end of a round on board games? Really?! I'm not sure the Pigs could hide their astonishment that it was so simple. That after 2 rounds - the Science one and the one after it - with hardly any points scored by either team. The first half was by far the better half of the quiz."

The History Men beat Dunkin' Dönitz at the Red. Ivor sums up....

"A rare victory over the Team Formerly Known As Griffin, and by the considerable margin of 15 points. I just have to type it again: '15 (fifteen) points' - the way the football scores teleprinter used to spell out unexpected scores such as 'Partick Thistle (six)'. I do not suppose it will be repeated for a decade or two. The questions fell to the right seats for us tonight and Anne was pleased to get a knitting pair though she spent several minutes disputing the 'knit one pearl one' answer."

The Bards of Didsbury beat The Prodigals at the Cricket Club in a close-fought contest keeping themselves squarely in the mix at the top of the table. Prodigal Danny reports in from the loser's corner....

"The old cliché that you can not win a game at the start but you can certainly lose one, applied tonight. We got off to a bad start and The Bards happily gobbled up the steals and so we were playing catch up all night. We battled on valiantly with some inspired answers (ok, guesses) but we were well held and the Bards were just too strong for us."

Quiz Paper Verdict

This week the questions were set by Compulsory Mantis Shrimp.

Since I'm in France (Lille to be precise) and have yet to see the paper I'll keep quiet and let the correspondents sum up.

Anne-Marie first....

"Great fun quiz from the Shrimps although the 2 knitters on The Prodigals team take issue with 'knit one, pearl one' as this is either rib or moss stitch, but definitely not stocking stitch. It is good to know that Shrimp David and I share the same birthday although I suspect many years apart."

James' comments above in 'The Results' section speak of overall frustration with a question imbalance and rather too many 'unanswerables'.

Mike O'Brien has this to add....

"Our knitting correspondent (Eveline) argued that the question on this subject was incorrectly worded and (gratefully) this was accepted by the others at the match.

If there are going to be paired questions involving more than one answer it would be better that each question required the same number of responses rather than asking one team for 2 answers and the other team for 3.

Our favourite question was the one referring to the Beatles adventures in Hamburg."

Ivor's view?....

"Needless to say we enjoyed the quiz and the themes. Plenty of questions for us oldies despite it being a Mantis Shrimp compilation. Our oldest team member decided to act as QM fully expecting teasers on contemporary music (that is anything after 1970). Instead we were pleasantly surprised by Muppet characters, Manchester mills and Rachel’s father’s '50s '60s and '70s entertainments. Mind you no one knew the content of a Cosmopolitan cocktail or the grape of a Prosecco (whatever happened to student life austerity?). And who would have expected Rolf Harris ever to feature in a quiz again?"

and Damian's....

"Tonight's paper from the Shrimpers was well received all round and, in line with most recent quiz offerings, rich on themes of various kinds. We particularly liked Rachael's tribute to some of the favourite things of her dear departed Dad in Round 3 but found the Recent Science round to be a little biased towards those of us who happen to subscribe to science journals. Some of the pairs were a bit uneven with, for instance, one pair asking us to name two things and the other one demanding to know three - but, minor quibbles aside, this was generally a very enjoyable quiz conducted in some very enjoyable company!"

and last but least Danny's....

"The paper was generally well received at the club. We found that there were good opportunities to score, along with some eye-rolling and muttering under the breath. Just how it should be. I would be delighted if a paper resulted in one tie, a one-point game and a two-point game. That sounds like they have got it just right. Finally can I congratulate The Historymen on their performance. That is a seriously good team they beat by 15 points!"

On a purely analytical basis I have to add this tailpiece to the above....the average aggregate of the Shrimps' paper at 71.8 was pretty good, and that there were three very close results, suggests the balance of hardness between the 'going first' questions and the 'going second' questions was not so out of kilter as some have claimed.

The Question of the Week

This week a number of you have opted for Round 8 Question 1 (though the bloody-minded setters indicated they thought that Round 6 Question 5 - the knitting one - was their own personal favourite):

The title of which Beatles song, also covered by the Carpenters and released on the album Help!, may have referred to cards indicating a clean bill of health carried by Hamburg prostitutes in the 1960s?

For the answer to this and all the week's questions click here.

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