Hello my friends, and welcome to another Quizzy Monday! Coming up, both UC and Mastermind continue on the final stages of their current series, with only four more episodes of both after tonight. But first, a shout out to our friend Dave Clark, who announced on LAM yesterday that he has been diagnoses with diabetic eye disease, which he had an appointment to discuss further this very morning; I'm sure you'll all join me when I say our thoughts are with him and we wish him all the best. In the meantime, on with tonight's shows, beginning with UC...
Manchester, largely fueled on by their captain's virtuoso buzzer showings, reached this stage after beating New College of Oxford and L.S.E., then losing their first QF to Edinburgh, before bouncing back with a 150-120 victory over U.C.L. in their second. They were the same unchanged foursome as those prior occasions:
Ray Power, from Bangkok, studying Film Studies and English Literature
Kirsty Dickson, from Morley Green in Cheshire, studying Medicine
Captain: Kai Madgwick, from Fowey in Cornwall, studying AI and Astrophysics
Rob Faulkner, from Norwich, studying Physics with Astrophysics
Sheffield came through the repechage after an opening day defeat to fellow quarter-finalists Warwick, then they also defeated New College and also Strathclyde, and then Darwin in their first QF, but they were defeated by Imperial 160-120 in their second. They were also the same quartet as all those previous outings:
Rhys Lewis, from Haverfordwest, studying Maths
Abdelrahman Elsisi, from Alexandria, Egypt, studying Engineering
Captain: Jacob Price, from Hethersett in Norfolk, studying Astrophysics
Isobel Dobbie, from Haringey in London, studying English Literature
Who else but Kai Madgwick opened the scoring for the night, and two bonuses accompanied their first starter; Sheffield responded in kind, but a penalty allowed the Manchester captain to pounce again. The Mancunians also took the first picture round, after which they led 60-15. Sheffield duly took two starters in a row, and went from getting none of the first bonuses to all of the second. But the Manchester captain halted their momentum with the next starter, before Ms Power gave them a second in a row to pull away again. Sheffield did take the music round, and devoured it in short order, which reduced the gap to 90-75.
Back came Manchester as their captain pulled them into three figures with a starter and two bonuses. Sheffield responded with two in a row which; only one bonus went with both, but it nonetheless pulled them back to within five points. But the inevitable Manchester captain opened their side's lead further again with two starters in a row and all but one of the esulting bonuses. They also took the second picture round, after which they now led 175-105. And when their captain took yet another starter, that was game over; no bonuses followed, but it didn't matter now. Sheffield did go out with a bit of a flurry, taking three starters, but none of the resulting bonuses killed off any chances of a late fightback. At the gong, Manchester won 185-135.
A good contest that was, as the chairman said, a lot closer than the final scores suggest. Well done Manchester, another excellent performance, from their captain especially again, but their teammates all did their bit as well this time; best of luck in the semis! Hard lines to Sheffield, but they've had a great run that they can be most pleased with; thanks very much for playing!
The stats: Kai Magdwick was, once again, the best buzzer of the night, with seven starters, taking their series total to 38, while Messrs Elsisi and Price were joint best for Sheffield with three each, the latter ending the series their best buzzer with a total of 25 over six games. On the bonuses, Manchester managed 17 out of 30 and Sheffield 10 out of 27 (with the night's one penalty).
Next week's match: Merton vs Darwin in the final quarter-final
Mastermind’s third semi-final,
with a now-ultra rare all-male line-up, was opened by Ross Taylor, who was
answering on the western films of Clint Eastwood; a potential banana skin subject,
but he made light work of it, only getting the last question wrong (I think)
and scoring a very good 12. He was followed into the chair by Pete Simmonds,
who was answering on Hieronymos Bosch; he also had a very good round with only
one error (that I noticed), but didn’t quite match Ross’ score, finishing with
11.
Next up was Tomas Stevenson, who
was answering on the studio albums of Bruce Springsteen; sadly, the questions
didn’t fall for him, and he finished with just 4, which all but ruled him out
of the running already. Finally, Eric Davis was answering on the late great
Cyrille Regis; he duly knocked the round out of the park, getting everything
right and topping the half-time scores (pun unintended) with 13.
So Tomas returned first for GK,
with putting up as good a score as he could his only real achievable objective;
he did that, scoring 10 for a perfectly respectable total of 14 and, as Dave C
often says, he was still a Mastermind semi-finalist and that can’t be taken
away from him. After the end credits, we were given the very sad news that
Tomas has since passed away; my deepest condolences to his family and friends.
It was going to be a three-way
sprint for the finish between the others now though; Pete went first, and put down
a big benchmark, scoring an excellent 14 for a great total of 25, which was
really going to give Ross and Eric something to think about.
Ross would be first to try and top
that; it was a close run thing, but he did indeed just about do that, and went one
better for good measure, scoring a fantastic 15 for a monstrous total of 27.
Which meant Eric was going to have to match that to win, and he’d definitely
have to do it as I believed he’d passed in the first round; he gave it a go,
but was soon off the pace and wasn’t going to make it. He scored 10, giving him
a still very good total of 23, but it did mean Ross was indeed through to the final!
Well done him, and best of luck to him in it!
And that's it for another week! Thanks as ever for reading; I'll try and keep these final remarks short as I'm running late tonight, but only four more outings to go and, hopefully, if the two finals are on the same day, I'll be able to do an on the day write-up and not have to wait until the next day again. Anyway, I'll definitely be back same time same place next Monday with my write-up, so, see yous then...
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