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Prodigals
beat KFD
Champagne Super Star!
...and there has been no greater WithQuiz superstar
down the years than Dave Rainford - so totally
fitting that last night's WithQuiz equivalent to
City v Liverpool (God, how he would have hated that
comparison!) started with a bubbly toast to former
Prodigals star, Dave...
 Winning skipper, Anne-Marie
sends these warm words...
After a very convivial evening at the club the
Prodigals came out on top by an 11-point margin in
what turned out to be a great quiz.
We toasted the start of the quiz with champagne in
honour of David Rainford. It was the first
time we had played KFD at the club since David died
- his last match was v Kieran and co. - and it made
sense to celebrate Dave tonight.
First ...
...and second...
...in the league. I hope Dave approves.
 ...meanwhile
Kieran
limbers up in the nets ready for the summer...
Our
man in Dubrovnik is .....in Dubrovnik, presumably
without the need for his Barbour jacket. It's
a curiosity of Barry's season that he's only missed
three games, one a couple of weeks ago against the
Historymen when laid low, thankfully briefly, and
both games against the Prodigals for 'holidays'.
Shades of Boycott holed up in Pear Tree Cottage
while Lillee, Thomson, Holding and Roberts rained
down fire on the inadequacy of England's top order.
No
matter, even younger Thomas eagerly stepped into the
opener's berth looking nothing like Mike Denness or
Dennis Amiss and much less like David Steele. There
might be a bit of Brian Close in him, however.
The first couple of rounds were friendly enough
looseners and then the Prodigals started the chin
music and blew us away. They were seemingly
playing a different game from us which is why they
are runaway champions and we ended with our lowest
score since I can't remember when. There's
nothing else to say about the quiz except to make
the point on Thomas's behalf that there were only
eight unanswereds (as you might expect in a game
between the two best teams in the league) and he
copped for three of them. And also to say that
if he picks Boycott as a role model I'll be more
than disappointed.
Oldest, Ugliest Honorary Oscar
(R8/Q2)
So,
despite it being a dead rubber the Prodigals never
thought to take it easy on us by blooding any raw
but promising talents they may have on their bench
(Clive Lloyd and the Chappell brothers looked on
approvingly). Instead they did something much
better and much more in the spirit of our league.
It was a little over two years ago that we played
the Prodigals at the club and of course they won,
but that night would be remembered for being Dave
Rainford's last WithQuiz game. This was the
first time this fixture had been played since then
so Anne-Marie and co. decided to mark the occasion
by laying on champagne for all of us to toast the
life and the memory of our much loved, much missed,
friend. Mark and Cheryl Facetimed in from
Vienna and it was just so much more important than
the quiz game that followed. I'm sure Dave was
there somewhere, smiling and I hope he knew while he
was still with us, how much of a vital figure in our
harmless pastime he was - and especially how much we
treasured him. Anne-Marie, Jimmy, Richard,
Michael and John you did him proud and we were
honoured and humbled to be able to toast him with you.
Dame of the Dance
(R2/Q4)
Of
course the fizz also meant that we were wrecked
before the quiz started and had the result mattered
at all well.... I have to say that I'd rather drink
good champagne than get a laser shone in my eye but
in their different ways both of those were hugely
enjoyable.
Next
week it's on to the Pigs for the last league game
and a reunion after five weeks with Bob the Hat.
There are many people in our quiz community whom we
only see on Wednesday evenings and whom we're all
the better for knowing. Bob's right up there
with the best. David's off to see a band that
I've never heard of and neither have you, trust me.
Barry's back, but Thomas will get another chance to
exorcise tonight's demons. So Prodigals play
nice, please.
 ...and
David adds...
In all my years in the league I've never played a
match under the influence of champagne before - and
it didn't do much for our performance!
The Brockton Blockbuster
(R3/Q3)
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One Dame
Like This
(R4/Q5)
Albert
lost to Electric Pigs
A great win for the Pigs at The Didsbury
 Mike
is rueful...
Another tough quiz but one which produced an
exciting contest which was not decided until the
last question.
QMing is a lonely business - you have to disappoint
your own team members by telling them that they are
wrong and hurrying them along when they are
struggling to find an answer, and then quelling them
when they are too boisterous. These are all
the reasons I LOVE doing it. The
disappointment on their little faces warms my Mr
Burns-type cold heart. Roll on the next
opportunity to spread misery. In Ashton's
absence (at a Gresley Rovers away fixture in the
Midlands Combination Premier League) Jeremy brought
a friend along, Julien Walkley, who used to be
involved with the League over 30 years ago (before
my time, before even Eveline's time) and very well
he did too.
Mary Hyra
(R2/Q6)
Charabancs
beat History Men
The Charas continue their unpredictable season
with a win
 Damian
is joyous...
Well, the Charas celebrated their last home match of
the season proper with a well earned (and long
overdue) victory against one of our favourite
all-time opponents. Beer flowed freely, chat
and banter flowed freely and Anne's blunt and
unprintable comments flowed freely. Most
importantly of all, the number of our correct
answers flowed freely (well fairly freely) with a
disciplined team performance tonight that managed to
avoid any unfortunate blurts. It resulted in
only our fourth victory of the season and a very
welcome one at that.
Every one of us scored at least one two with our
star performer of the night being John who notched
up no less than five - but we all contributed
positively on the many confers. As so often
the case against the Historymen it was a close match
with the lead changing hands every other round until
we finally managed to establish a lead in Round 6
that, for once, we managed to hold onto.
Hallelujah as the late great Leonard Cohen would
say!!
Muse to Schubert and Schumann
(R7/Q5)
...whilst Ivor is philosophical...
It is 20 years since we first played the Charabancs
(in their then incarnation as The Brains of Oak) in
the happy days of 2002/3 when we both challenged for
second or third place in the League. How much has
changed since then! Well actually, not much.
The teams were largely the same in personnel (at
least 5, maybe 6, players tonight). If we were
rather older, we were not any more knowledgeable.
The things that did not interest us then, did not
interest us now - and there was little evidence that
any of us had made any effort to plug the gaps in
our repertoire such as lists of Oscar winners,
current paramours of celebrities, or towns hosting
defunct motor marques. That is the difference
between us worthy amateurs and the professional
Chasers, but it would also account for our drift
down the League table in recent years (though we
accept it is also because there are better players
than us now). Anyhow it was a most convivial
evening with old friends.
NW's largest development project - here in City
Centre Manchester
(R2/Q1)
Bards lost
to Opsimaths
The Opsimaths return to form continues
 Mike
reports from the Opsi's bench...
What
a delight it's been each week this season to get
back together again with our traditional WithQuiz
foes! I have been trading
quizzical punches with Tony and Jim for more years
than I care to remember. However this week I
met Bard newcomer Robin for the first time.
Robin is a lecturer at Salford Uni and a colleague
of Jim's. His presence in Seat 1 for the Bards
led to the memorable line from our QM in Round 4:
"Robin, Reliant Motors were based in which Midland
town?"
The
match could have gone either way with never more
than 2 points in it until the last question saw the
visitors end the evening 4 points ahead - so a
beautifully balanced paper from Ethel.
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Quiz paper set by...
...Ethel Rodin
Average Aggregate score 68.8
As
with last week's KFD offering, this week Ethel
turned up a paper that scored a little below the
season's average, but more than made up for this by
being full of delights.
Popular culture was restricted to the truly
memorable, and (predictably with Roddy and James on
compiling duties) classical music got a hefty look
in. There were close results all round, except
at the Club where KFD claim they were nobbled before
the negotiations could get underway - see Kieran's
report above. So it was clearly a paper that
had been carefully edited to ensure fair balance.
The
mental arithmetic teasers in Round 7 brought an
interesting variation to our normal fare, but didn't
half slow things up as Hilary examined the ceiling
and Howell and Nick went into 11+ mode for the best
part of 5 minutes. A welcome addition to a
week's quiz but no more than 2 of these per paper,
please.
When 'One Nation' really meant it
(R5/Q4)
but what did Damian think...
We found tonight's paper a bit of a toughie but
nevertheless one that played to our collective
strengths. There was an interesting variation
to the popular 'Run-ons' format which we did well on
- and some amusing Spoonerism questions which I
think is a first for WithQuiz. Although I
don't think we guessed any of the themes, for once
it didn't hold us back from guessing many of the
answers correctly. The unanswereds split
evenly between us with 6 apiece as Statsmeister,
Ivor (who quickly worked everything out as usual),
will no doubt confirm.
Most amusing question of the night (which fell to
us) was probably the Spoonerism involving a popular
US snack and dubious activities going on in a police
station. Schoolboy sniggers all round on that
one!
First Division One title hat-trick;
A must for a PM's back pocket
(R6/Q1)
and Mike O'B adds...
The literary run ons were very popular. They
provide a fresh twist to what has become a well used
formula.
and finally Ivor gives his verdict...
A combined score of 70 suggests a moderately hard
quiz. And it was - 12 unanswereds (6-6), only 18
twos (the Charas got 11 of them) with the Charas'
superior steal rate (7-6) helping them to a clear
win, though it was 18-18 at half time.
It was quite a slow quiz with a number of 'constipaters',
not least the mathematical problems in Round 7.
Very difficult to calculate current rates when
numbers are also swimming in one’s head (it was
'third pint' time). We agreed that whoever the
athlete in the question was it would certainly not
be a Historyman (or woman) doing wild swimming.
The quiz paper was certainly well crafted with the
literature Run-ons (especially Little Donkey/Oti
Mabuse) well appreciated. Sadly despite the
cryptic hints we did not twig the anagrams of Round
2, nor get the unions in Round 5 until too late.
Plenty of things to learn tonight and perhaps we
will - or perhaps not. Heine, Maeterlinck,
Paula Rego and Jada Pinkett have passed me by and
probably will the next time.
"a disgruntled weakly alcoholic
drink"
(R6/Q8)
Question of the Week
This week The Charas vote for Round 6 Question 7...
Which snack, especially popular in United States,
would Spooner express as blue movies for the police
force?
For the answer to this and all the week's other
questions click
here.
Tango Maestro
(R2/Q3)
...and also
This
week sees the return of the oldest and most
venerable of quiz shows, predating everybody in our
League bar Tony Hammond, Hilary and myself (I
think). Round Britain Quiz, first
broadcast in 1947, returns on Radio 4 (that's the
Home Service, Tony) on Mondays at 3pm with repeats
aired at 11pm on Saturday evenings. Opsimath
Old Boy Paddy Duffy is once again one of the
pair representing Northern Ireland and you can hear
him next Monday when NI take on The South of England
in the second match of the series.
Each
week they leave the listeners with a poser answered
by the host Kirsty Lang at the start of the
following show. To get you into the mood
here's the poser from the first programme:
"Where might you repair to, if you looked to the
Occident and found a Scottish place of worship,
a collection of sharp objects and a central
depression, located alongside an antipodean
street?"
Midland Grand Tourer
(R4/Q2)
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