Withington Pub Quiz League - quizbiz 09/03/22

Clean sweep for the away teams as 4 of the top 5 win;

no change to the order of the table

Charabancs lost to Bards

History Men lost to KFD

Electric Pigs lost to Ethel Rodin

Opsimaths lost to Prodigals

Thatcher's favourite Civil Servant

(R2/Q1)

Charabancs lost to Bards

Bards continue their improving run

Damian reflects on some Charas no longer on fire...

Our first home match of the year resulted in our first defeat of the year. It's not that we played badly (as our score shows) it's just that our opponents were simply that much better. They happened to be just that much better in every single round maintaining a steady lead right to the end.

All in all it was an enjoyable evening with us finally getting the pleasure of re-acquainting ourselves with our stalwart QM Jane whom we hadn't seen at all this year - but whose steady hand at the helm we will now witness for our next three quiz outings.

'The Unknown Prime Minister'

(R3/Q2)

Electric Pigs lost to Ethel Rodin

Ethel get back to winning ways after 3 defeats on the trot

"Greed, for lack of a better word, is good"

(R4/1987)

Opsimaths lost to Prodigals

The Prods just power towards their next title

Latecomer Mike reflects...

Well, it wasn't late by accident, but by design. I was at the Etihad watching a dead rubber wind to a yawnworthy conclusion as City and Sporting Lisbon drew 0-0.

So it was Nick, Brian, Hilary and Howell wearing the Opsi colours. By the time I arrived the match was over and Prods Richard, Michael and John were clearly very happy at yet another convincing victory.

Judging by the smiles the paper had gone down pretty well. Albertiste Jeremy had kindly carried out the QMing duties giving him a first hand insight into how his own questions had gone down.

Lingua's long...

(R1/Q5)

...on the palate

(R3/Q7)

In the post-match chat I tackled Michael and Richard about recruiting more teams for our league. Maybe some of the newer members of the University Challenge production team might be looking for a busman's holiday on a Wednesday evening? Maybe some of the Manchester University University Challenge competitors who are still in town would welcome a chance to keep their quizzing going? And wouldn't an influx of younger teams and players address the 'old man question' problem, some believe we suffer from, by having a group of new setters who set according to their own interests and time horizons?

At any rate were we to recruit 2 new teams for the 2022/23 season it would breath much needed new life into the league and ensure it prospered for years to come.

Algonquin wisecracker

(R8/Q5&6)

History Men lost to KFD

Squeaky Bum time for KFD as they win - just

Kieran relives his relief...

For once the Pied Piper failed to attract any of KFD's promising academy products so we were three-handed to the Parrs Wood, Barry suffering a recurrence of the migraine syndrome which, alas, incapacitates him from time to time. Hope this attack doesn't last long both for his sake and for ours. We need him at the business end of the season and he would have done well on tonight's paper.

When we got underway Anne delivered a shot by shot retake of our encounter in the first match of the season berating David for timidity on the opening question, and the evening proceeded as expected from there. Ivor bore the abuse directed his way with the grace that comes from enduring many years of the same and also having a generally even-tempered demeanour.

Heroic campaigning teacher

(R1/Q2)

The team dynamic of the Historymen is fascinating. You'd be in their company a long time before the word collegiate came to mind. Despite his crazed touchline whirlings and anguished contempt for the slightest error, you just know that Pep loves every single player in his squad, even Scott Carson, in fact especially Scott Carson. Watching the Historymen it's more Antonio Conte appropriately enough. I make no aspersions about hair transplants.

A few miles to the east Jesus was being denied three times (bit early in Lent for that) but KFD refused to suffer the same fate. Trademark excellent conferring (Kiki Dee, Blue and George Michael for the Elton collaborators was a highlight) was paired with some spectacular solo strikes. Personally I was particularly proud of appliqué, which incited Anne to shout stocking stitch at me several times for no reason that I could fathom.

Constable Country

(R5/Q3)

I got the 'Hannibal Lecter actors' question for a two (very glad that only two names were required because I would have struggled to name a third) but there was a suggestion from our hosts that I had said Brian Clough as the second answer. God I'd have loved to have seen that movie. Anyway it gave me the opportunity to bellow "COX" loudly and repeatedly at our hosts. Which was fun.

The hurly burly done and the battle lost and won, we discussed contributors to this home page and their outputs, Ivor and I being two of the chief ~~culprits~~ scribes. We agreed that we all missed Rachael's match reports so as a tribute I can say that an acrimonious evening was thoroughly enjoyed by all. Not really, I imagine it was just like being in Spurs' dressing room after losing to Burnley, or beating City, it would be the same.

Albert next week in what is most likely to be the runner up decider with the Prodigals maintaining their comfortable lead at the top. Ah well, "KBO" as Churchill always ended his messages to Roosevelt, who didn't have a clue what it meant.

Gaggle of Giggleswickians

(R1/Q7)

and Ivor casts his runes...

Our home record has been rather good this season with four victories on the trot only brought to an end by defeat at the hands of the Albert last week. This compares well with our away record (6 consecutive losses). This is difficult to explain in the quizzing world. Unlike the world of Association Football quizzers do not have do not have masses of cheering home fans to improve our competitive spirit nor even managers ensuring the visiting team have the worse seating and dodgy end of cask pints. Indeed quizzing as a spectator sport is probably down there with the Dulux Paint Sampler Drying World Championships. Anyway we did have high hopes of vanquishing our old rivals KFD especially when there was only three of them. Sadly it was not to be, and although we only lost by a point we were always behind and Kieran’s team huddled together like a Roman testudo to resist any of our attempts to thwart them. Kieran will no doubt comment on Anne’s Boudica-like efforts. At least it was not humiliation on the scale of our recent Lowly Grail battle against the same opposition.

We are philosophical in defeat - perhaps free ale helps recovery of battle wounds. Unfortunately the scab was picked off when we found out that we had copped it for setting the questions in the first round of the Cup. Any delight we might feel at setting a searching test for those most competitive teams, Ethel and KFD, is tempered by the fact we will have to face one or other in the next round. The Val Draper Cup has been on my mantelpiece since 2019 (because of Covid-19). Keeping it there will be a challenge.

"I coulda had class. I coulda been a contender. I coulda been somebody."

(R4/1954)

Quiz paper set by...

...Albert

Average Aggregate score 79.8

As an absentee Opsimath this week I'll step back from any judgement other than to say that the teams at the Albert Club seemed very happy with an evening spent in the company of Albert's collective brains.

"A boy's best friend is his mother"

(R4/1960)

but what did Damian think...

We all enjoyed the Albert's paper. Most of the questions seemed perfectly gettable and there was nothing too head-scratching about any of them. The final quotations round was maybe a little on the wordy side but, again, most of them were accessible. I counted only 5 unanswerables which mostly fell our way. Incidentally, one of the Bards posed the question "What are the usual caveats that apply?" in reference to the now standard preamble to a round of Run-ons. Does anybody still remember what they are?

and QM Mike H adds...

As QM, I enjoyed the quiz with its high-scoring and close finish in which the History Men lost to the team I always think of as Kentucky Fried Donuts by just a single point. The first half scores were 20 all and in the second half KFD just edged it 21-20, so pretty much a well-balanced quiz - one that was generally speaking more accessible than many.

Least popular round was Round 3 which we found too vague. All but 6 of the questions were answered (though as Ann said "Not by us!"). One of the unanswered ones was about Alice in Wonderland and I'm sure I would have got that one right. The first unanswered question was Round 3 Question 5 and that was closely followed by Round 3 Question 6 going begging. David was disappointed not to get the Liverpool question but then again it was well before his time!

Finally a request from the QM seat...it would much help if each round was on a different page.

Finally Ivor comments...

The quiz tonight was a reasonable challenge. With our combined score of 81 and three unanswereds on each side, it was the right level of difficulty with enough balance for a fair match. The 'Few from Many' round was nicely poised as it would be easy to make the question barely answerable had an extra 'few' been required (for example Matt Monroe’s film hits, or Elton John’s duettists) - and the film round included films and actors we had heard of.

My only criticism is the 'Quotes' round, not because of the content but because of the unenviable role of the QM in determining what was 'close enough', especially if the match result depended on the last few questions (which, fortunately, it did not in our case). Perhaps that round could have been in the first half. I shall stop now before I get a reputation like Mickie Most and Tony Hatch on New Faces.

Forever infamous

(R7/Q4)

Question of the Week

This week the Opsimaths and The Prodigals really liked Round 7 (Run-ons) Question 4...

Franklin D Roosevelt’s description of 7th December 1941 (7 words),

Kenneth Williams’s anguished cry when attacked in the Temple of Vesta in Carry on Cleo (9 words).

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

...and also

In order to help players plan their holidays over the coming weeks I have been asked to make the Val Draper Cup draw as soon as possible - so this week at the Albert Club Howell and the Opsimaths aided by the Prodigals scrabbled their balls and drew as follows...

Round 1 (April 13th)

with a paper set by History Men

Ethel Rodin play KFD

Round 2 (April 27th)

with a paper set by Round 1 losers

Round 1 winners play History Men

Prodigals play Opsimaths

Electric Pigs play Albert

Bards play Charabancs

I have added these fixtures to the Fixtures page.

Along with local friend (Don Berry) I host a weekly chat/music show on local community radio station ALL FM (96.9 FM & online).

Next Tuesday, March 15th, between 10 and 11 in the morning James from the Ethel Rodin team is our guest. He'll be talking about his life as an A&E Consultant at Warrington General Hospital as well as choosing his 8 music tracks. We've already recorded the show and I hope you'll find it a really good insight into our mutual quizzing friend.

If you can't get to listen to it next Tuesday morning then it'll be available on the Mixcloud website from Tuesday onwards (just search for 'Vintage FM Don and Mike’).