In response to this cerebral assault The Opsimaths were on poor form - not just with our lack of appropriate knowledge but our bad judgement.  We got The Oxnoble and Black Sabbath answers, but blew both through faulty conferring.  We did get a slightly harsher 'rub of the green' with seven unanswerable questions to the Shrimps' four, but our opponent's massive 15 twos to our paltry 5 shows who was really in charge.  Talking of which Hilary was on excellent form in the QM chair - firm, fair and friendly.

All these comments play into the piece I've written at the foot of this page, which in turn was sparked by the comments of James (of Ethel Rodin) and Gerry on the message board last week.  Do have a gander and comment back to me or to the message board.

The Charabancs of Fire keep getting on the wrong end of close encounters - this time at home to Albert.  There was only one point in it at the death as Mike O'B explains....

"The scene was set for a thrilling encounter right from the start when Gerry tossed the coin and asked me to call without remembering to cover the coin with his hand.  Even the Albert wouldn't pass up the chance to get something right."

And how shall I describe the Charas?  I think I will leave it to Leon Trotsky in his critique of the reactionary elements in Russia in 1921:

'Wearing showy bellbottom pants and sporty haircuts; hoarders, self-aggrandisers ....dandified and well fed.'  Surely there is nothing to add."

....and Damian weighs in from the losing side....

"Father M has decided to institute a new ruling that whoever fails to score at least one two will be confined to the bench for the following week's outing.  Even this desperate measure to increase the attraction of bunking off for a week failed to produce the desired effect as each Chara managed to notch up at least one two on tonight's paper.  As a result our reverend captain is now scratching the few surviving hairs on his venerable bonce to come up with a more certain method to get us off his team.  He has threatened to invoke the Holy Spirit once he has paid a visit to the Off Licence to re-stock.  We await with collective baited breaths!

As the scores show, this was a close-fought contest that went right down to the wire.  We  led confidently in the first 2 rounds and then got clawed back by our increasingly confident opponents.  From there on we never quite managed to regain the initiative.  We could at least have managed a draw If only I had had the guts to go for 'Homburg Hat' when asked for the link between Anthony Eden, Tony Hancock and Procol Harum; a classic example of too much information deterring me from coming up with the correct answer - but I should have guessed and gone for it anyhow.  Mea culpa!"
 

Dunkin' Dönitz continued their upward spiral following their defeat on the first day of the season; this time with a comfortable victory over The Bards of Didsbury.  Kieran reports....

"The Bards made the short trip from the cricket club to Heaton Mersey as the only team in the league with a winning record against us since 'Nemesis' six and a half years ago.  They leave, still with a winning record, but the margin has narrowed.  We've had huge battles with Tony & co. down the years. Twice in their trophy-gathering seasons they've beaten us three times in three different competitions in the space of four or five weeks so it was especially satisfying to be able to raise our colours at the end of the evening in this season's first encounter.   

Next week the Griffin again and unbeaten league leaders Mantis Shrimp.  Should be some game - and Anne Marie and the Prodigals, please no pop music after 1989, but plenty before is ok!"     

The History Men lost in the Red to The Prodigals who're starting to get their act together.  Victorious captain, Anne-Marie sends this....

"Good fun this evening at the Red Lion with the History People.  The Prodigals were inspired by watching fellow Prodigal, Michael, in the Mastermind final recording the day before.  Obviously can’t let you know the outcome but it will be worth watching.

....while Ivor sends this....

"This lower table clash resulted in a great victory for the Prodigals.  However, win or lose, we always have an entertaining evening with plenty of laughs though sadly for the first two rounds these emanated from another table in the Red Lion snug and included a woman who must have been trained by Stentor himself. 

Another good paper full of diverse subjects and engagingly varied ways of seeking answers.  The level of difficulty seemed just right with (we thought at the Albert Club) a slight advantage to the team going first.  We had plenty of chat about the subject matter during and after the questions which taxed QM Hilary in her attempts to keep order, and irked time-keeper Jitka.  We finished a bit later than desired (about 10.35 I think) but we'd had loads of fun on the way.

My own favourite round was Round 5 which contained a wonderfully timely theme - especially given these days of faux patriotism used as a cloak for the disdain of those who are different from your average Daily Mail or Daily Telegraph reader.  Real patriotism involves sacrifice for others - not sacrificing others for oneself.  And what's more just as Brian had spotted the theme for this round and hurriedly shared it with the rest of the team, I got the one about the Everton goalie - so could slot home Gordon West who even Shrimp James had never heard of.  On the downside - later on in the quiz - I did manage to work out that 'eight' had all its letters in alphabetical sequence!

The paper went down well in other parts of South Manchester as well....

Ivor comments....

"Andrew Simcock was present to see how his Pig’s paper was received and not many brickbats were thrown - not even by Anne.  There was a combined score of 75 with just 8 unanswereds breaking 4-4.  The themes were all detected (eventually) though looking for horse colours rather than browns in Round 1 did mislead us for a while.  We knew we would struggle in Round 8 with no Mancunian natives but it was Round 7 that really did for us."

....and Mike O'B....

"I'm not so sure it was wise to go first - but despite this the scores were tight all the way through and the aggregate suggests that there were plenty of points on offer."

....and Damian....

"Tonight's paper was full of interesting and varied themes and topics which, by and large, we all enjoyed.  As usual, the (Manchester themed) Bingo round met with our complete approval and we even managed to do quite well on it this time round!  Going first it was a good job I spotted the Manchester theme at the last moment before being tempted to plump for 'History' (good on the general, crap on the local) and veered off to pick 'Science' instead (more confident on Manc scientists) and so saved my place on the team by scoring my only two of the evening!"

....and, including his own personal gripe, Kieran....

"You really can't ask for three answers to the first part of a paired question and only one for its companion.  On the other hand, the number that scores its own value in Scrabble was a great WithQuiz question - and was, of course, put away for a two by (you can't keep him out of the action tonight) Barry.  A personal gripe would be that the construction of the ****ing airport relief road has made my commute to work a total misery for the last three years and I still didn't get the points because I located one end of it in Poynton.  The traffic there is as bad as in Hazel Grove but the Poynton branch is a different road.  Apparently.  Hell does not have enough eye gouging, organ burning, testicle slicing torments for everyone from the planners to the navvies involved in that abomination." 

and here are a couple more for you to ponder.  Answers next week.

Albert Club Quiz - 170925 - Listomania - Questions

Albert Club Quiz - 171030 - Nation's Favourite Poem - Questions

I'm pleased to tell you that Mark and Cheryl Bassett have agreed to be our Guests of Honour on March 28th.

WithQuiz at 40 ….. and beyond?

Last week, via the message board, James and Gerry raised an important issue that’s been buzzing around WithQuiz for a while; namely the reducing appeal of our weekly pastime to younger generations.

Both Gerry and James have first-hand experience of this and I can chip in from my own efforts to persuade children and, now grandchildren, (who’re generally keen on quizzes) to join either WithQuiz or the monthly Albert Club quizzes.  The usual reasons given are the excessive focus we place on popular culture from bygone eras and the general level of difficulty of the questions.  Occasionally they cite the length of each match which leaves little time for socialising and drinking.

• Setters should think hard before setting popular culture questions (pop music, TV, films, etc.) – especially from 40 or 50 years back.  Questions need to be accessible to most competitors – e.g. Elvis Presley seems OK to me as a subject but not a number three hit from The Swinging Blue Jeans; Dad’s Army is OK but not Meet the Wife.  Of course it’s a bugger trying to decide when ‘here today gone tomorrow’ stuff transmogrifies into general knowledge and we have to accept that often we’ll get this judgement wrong.

• Setters should seek to make their question text shorter and more succinct.  An occasional three-line question is fine but a whole round of them is OTT.  Not only does it take longer to read but players find it harder to absorb all the information presented and will certainly ask for the text to be repeated two or three times.

• Let’s have some more comments about the question papers from our younger competitors; it would be great, for instance, to have some honest critical feedback now and again from Shrimps Richard or James, or from the younger element of the Pigs team.  Be sure that I’ll publish any such feedback on the website.

• We should ask our QMs to continue pressing us for answers with the aim of finishing a match by 10.15pm – and players should be sympathetic to their QM over this.

• Finally we need to market ourselves in a more systematic fashion – not just before the start of a season when we are one team down.  Most people in South Manchester who enjoy watching quiz shows on TV (such as University Challenge or Only Connect), or take part in the occasional local pub quiz, ought be aware of the existence of WithQuiz.  At present I suspect they’re not.