Withington Pub Quiz League - quizbiz 01/02/17

Albert and The Opsimaths creep a little closer to the Dunkers at the top; the Shrimps and the Prodigals miss out

The Results

At the Turnpike Compulsory Mantis Shrimp swam into an earlier lead only to be pegged back and ultimately defeated by the old brains of The Opsimaths.

The saloon bar was quiz-dominated throughout the evening with spectators urging on both teams (whilst obviously keeping a mobile eye on the events at The London Stadium and Old T). The close-fought match ended well before 10.30 enabling both squads to sink back into lively conversation about this and that. One of the post-match chat outcomes was a resolution on my part not to stereotype the Shrimps by referring to them as 'the Students' - after all only James and Adam are still studying and Adam is well into that elderly stage of studenthood called 'PhD studies'. Coming up with an alternative soubriquet that signalled youth, yet could not be construed as mildly offensive, proved hard. I suggested the 'pre-middleagers' but I'm not sure this went down too well.

I was 'on the bench' for this match letting Nick (MVP with 5 twos), Howell, Clare and Brian fight the good fight. Indeed I seem these days to be engaged in more quiz-setting (with all the Albert Club quizzes) than quiz-answering - and so it was interesting to listen to the comments of Shrimp Tom whose job is to vet all the University Challenge questions before they get into the pack of cards that Jeremy Paxman brandishes. I think he pretty much approved of the Dunkers' offering but his comments underlined what a totally different skill-set is needed to set good quiz papers, to that needed to answer the questions successfully.

The Bards of Didsbury continued their return to form at the Cricket Club outclassing The Electric Pigs. Mike H acted as QM and sends this despatch....

"This week I was QMing for the Bards - and, as it happens, we were playing the same team that I met last week in my appearance as a guest player for the History Men.

The Bards won convincingly. However it wasn't all one way. After a positive start, it was getting very close by the end of round 6, helped in part by my refusal to give Jim 2 points for answering 'Royal March' as the name of the Spanish national anthem."

Meanwhile down at the Ladybarn Club Ethel Rodin notched up the highest score of the evening in beating The Charabancs of Fire. Damian sends this report....

"Well, we scored 2 more points than last week and 3 more than than the week before that, but it still did us no good. The pattern of the scoring went very much the same way as many of our previous efforts with us keeping close pace with our opponents all the way through only to fall apart in the last round. There always seems to be at least one round that kills off our chances and, tonight, that happened to be the very last one when a narrow gap of no more than 2 or 3 points average throughout most of the match suddenly stretched to 9. So that's one more round of drinks we've managed to avoid having to buy then! Chara John's money is safe for yet another week!"

Albert cantered to a home victory at the Fletcher Moss against The Men They Couldn't Hang. Mike O'B fills us in, including news of some disquiet in his own ranks....

"The aggregate score suggests that this was a tough quiz. The second half was a little kinder to us than the first as indicated by the fact that the half time score was 16-8. The overall effect of the quiz was to engender a fair amount of blurting which obliged me to deploy the Paddle on four occasions during the evening - something which has not occurred for several years. Sad to say one of our number (she knows who she is) refused to acknowledge the Paddle and attempted to sit on it. I have informed team member 'X' (as I will refer to her) that her unacceptable behaviour tonight combined with her physical assault on me at an earlier fixture has forced me to seek legal advice from Mr Compensator whose offices are to be found at Anson Road. The fact that his picture shows him to be wearing a superhero outfit with a large golden 'C' on the chest leads me to believe that he is a chap who knows a thing or two about legal matters and will put an end to the indiscipline which currently plagues our team."

Not to be outwhackied, Graham reports in from the losing side of the table....

"An hilarious night at the Fletcher Moss despite losing. As Il Capitano Dave puts it, 'A game of four quarters - more for us in the last than the first three.'"

At the Albert Club The Prodigals run of 5 successive victories came to a juddering halt at the hands of The History Men. Ivor tells the tale....

"A very pleasant evening in the back room of the Albert Club relatively insulated from the football in the main lounge. How could it be otherwise in the company of the Prodigals? And for us the added bonus of our second win in a row. Perhaps the glory days are not half-remembered dreams after all. This was also a rare example of us coming from behind and actually accelerating in the final round - regular readers will know we have imploded more times in quizzes than stars in a Foundation universe."

The Paper

This week the paper was set by Dunkin' Dönitz.

An average aggregate score of 70.8, a shade below the season's overall average of 73.0 - but by common consent a cracking effort, wheeling out all the tricks of the WithQuiz setting trade: hidden themes with and without titles to point the way, mixed pairs and announced themes - with a few 'find the link' questions thrown in along the way. In short a quiz to suit any Tom, Dick or Harry! To cap it all the evening kicked off with a trademark Dillon* insult to your worthy Webmaster linking him to Adolf von Trump. Revenge will be sweet when we get the travel restrictions in place for all quiz teams who ply their trade in pubs not based in Manchester. At the Turnpike there were just 6 unanswered questions during the evening which is well within acceptable limits.

Constructive criticism? Well, earlier QuizBizs have touched on the complexity of hidden theme rounds where 'each answer contains a word that might precede (or succeed) a theme word'. I seem to recall that Dave Barras has been rather fond of these in the past but now only deploys the device in 'Announced theme' rounds. I can see that announcing the theme to Round 1 in this paper would have spoilt the fun (?) of revealing the link between me and the Donald. Perhaps it would have been better to use the round later in the evening once both teams were in their stride. As it was the theme acted as somewhat of a distraction at the Turnpike until an inspired James worked it out for the Shrimps towards the end of the round, and treated us to an explanation which included a justification for Trump clutching Theresa May by the hand. If Morecambe and Wise were still around the perfect solution to the Trump Question might have been to ask the Donald on to their Christmas Show and get him to walk down the never-ending staircase (you know the one they made Glenda Jackson navigate).

Other feedback on this week's paper?....

....from Mike H....

"Paired questions can be easier for the second team throughout a round - for instance when the first question of a pair is on items or persons mentioned in a song - whereas themed rounds can be easier on later players on both sides once the theme is established. In this game neither team got the first answer in Round 7 but certainly would have done if they'd known the theme. A little harsh in Round 3 Question 4 to ask for three answers just to get the points (Steve got one of the answers but couldn't get the other two). My own favourite question was the one on a quote predicting death in 1566."

....from Ivor....

"A moderately hard quiz from the Donuts with 14 unanswereds. It probably helped our cause when the threat of Prodigal Michael was neutralised by him getting four consecutive unanswereds - though David 'Tremendous Knowledge' Rainford lived up to his soubriquet with 5 twos. We did have a few lucky guesses with answers we nearly didn't proffer (on the assumption of unlikelihood) including Opel cars, and Reasons to be Cheerful. In terms of interest there were some excellent teasers though sadly, despite 1976 being my era, the cryptic nature of the question on Ruby Flipper flummoxed me completely (Ruby Flipper, really, 40 years ago!!!). We did observe that most quizzers are very comfortable with the old film questions but those on modern films seem to pass us by. Perhaps we should get out more."

....from Damian....

"The consensus seemed to be that tonight's paper from Dunkin Dönitz was a reasonably okay effort with some stuff we liked and some we weren't so keen on. There were quite a few of the 'either you know it or you don't' variety - for instance: 'Which reference book first appeared in 1884?', while the hidden themes were usually fairly straightforward to work out and actually helped us in finding the answers. In contrast the announced themes didn't always do the same - for instance the 'Beatles Songs' round and the 'Tom, Dick and Harry' round at the end.

QotW? Well, we did like the one about the 1566 deathbed quotation. Why are so many famous people so garrulous just before they kick the bucket?"

....from Mike O'B....

"The quiz was peppered with interesting and imaginative questions. Our favourite was Round 3 Question 1 even though none of us knew the answer."

...and from Graham....

"Our favourite question was the 'Goodbye, My Dear Beaver' quote. A well set quiz heartily enjoyed by all."

* I now learn that 'the trademark insult' was a Delahunty creation. My humble apologies to Kieran - I'll buy you a drink when we beat you at the Club in early March

Question of the Week

This week the Shrimps (well Rachael, actually) got the right answer for Round 3 Question 6 before they talked themselves out of it so naturally they felt it merited the QotW gong:

Whose last words, before he died in 1566, were, “Tomorrow, at sunrise, I shall no longer be here”?

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

....and also

Next week sees the semi finals of the two WIST interleague competitions. Three of the matches are all-WithQuiz affairs whilst the Traveller's Call and the Alexandra fight it out for the Stockport place in the WIST Champions Final. For WithQuiz teams all the papers will be at the Red Lion as usual. For the Stockport match Mike Wagstaffe will ensure the paper gets there.

BTW Mike tells me that this time the paper has been set by Ethel's Greg Spiller (who also plays on Thursdays in the Stockport League as a member of the Smart Italics team). Many thanks, Greg!