Good evening from Ayrshire, for the first match I've viewed outside of my home county since the Summer of 2011! Tonight would see the end of the road for one of two teams, both of whom had impressed early on. As I mentioned over on LAM, this is the first time under the new QF system where the two teams who won their preliminary but lost their qualifier face off in the play-off.
Reigning champions Manchester have more than made up for that 'scare' against Lincoln in the first round, beating Magdalen and Imperial comfortably, before losing a good match to U.C.L.. They were still:
David Brice, from
Kingston-upon-Thames, studying Economics
Adam Barr, from
Muswell Hill in London, studying Physics with Astrophysics
Captain: Richard
Gilbert, from Warwickshire, studying Linguistics
Debbie Brown, from
Buxton, studying Pain Epidemiology
St George's impressed hugely in the early stages, narrowly beating our man James G. and co from King's in the first round, before more comprehensive wins over Lancaster and Pembroke, but New College proved too much for them in their qualifier. They remained:
Shashank Sivaji, from Southend-on-Sea,
studying Medicine
Alexander Suebsaeng, from London,
studying Medicine
Captain: Rebecca Smoker, from County
Kildare, studying Medicine
Sam Mindel, from London, studying
Medicine
You know, I've been wondering what happens at reunions for St George's graduates; it might end up a bit like this.
Alexander Suebsaeng, impressive in earlier rounds, got St George's off to the better start, but no bonuses followed. Manchester then dominated the remainder of the opening phase, with both starters and bonuses falling their way. A mis-buzz from St George's reduced their score into single figures. The first picture round was on a map of the Ivy League unis, the starter of which I (correctly) guessed on, as it made sense.
Manchester currently led by 75-5, and continued their domination with the next starter. But then two consecutive starters from Sam Mindel, and two full sets of bonuses bought St George's back into the game with a bang. A third starter followed for the medics, but no bonuses this time. Shashank Sivaji tried an early buzz on an American politics question, only to be beaten by a swerve. The music round saw Manchester employ the common tactic of answering all three bonuses with the same answer, in the hope it will be right once! It worked! And the champs now led by 110-60.
Throughout the third phase, the sides generally swapped starters, with neither being able to gather a run of momentum. The second picture round was on female winners of Nobel prizes, which saw St George's have an unlucky miss on Marie Curie, naming one of the awards she won, but not the other. The score was now 140-90 to Manchester, so the scores had risen, but the gap had stayed the same.
Going into the final phase, it was still all to play for. A very impressive early buzz from Adam Barr saw Manchester increase their lead. But St George's hit straight back, with two consecutive starters, reducing the gap to 35.
But this was as close as they were going to get, as Manchester pulled ahead again with the next starter. An incorrect early buzz from Manchester gave the medics the chance to close the gap again, but no bonuses followed the starter. And from that point on, Manchester pulled away, and firmly cemented their lead. At the gong, Manchester won by 220-135. The final score suggests a far less closer match than it was.
It's a shame for St George's, who were looking like potential champions at one point, but clearly the pressure got to them in the end. Sam Mindel led the way for them tonight, getting six starters, and the side managed 11 bonuses out of 27 with two penalties. Adam Barr also managed six starters, which was Manchester's best tally, and the side answered 19 bonuses out of 36 correctly, with one late penalty.
Next week: the final quarter-final sees Bangor play King's for the last place in the semi-finals, in a clash of the 'blog reader' teams. Best of luck to all involved!
Hopefully, a review of this afternoon's Third Degree will be up by Sunday night. I missed it this afternoon, as I forgot it was on, but I know the outcome, and it sounds intriguing.
At the time of recording I had never seen any of Manchester's previous matches, but they're always going to be a tough team so even before the match it seemed likely that St. George's would struggle to win this. And so it proved, sadly. Over the recordings we'd consistently been filming at the same slots as them so had got to know each other fairly well, and despite losing to them in the first round I was rooting for them. Missed a couple of what I thought to be sitters but the margin was such that it wouldn't have made that much difference, and Manchester are worthy semi-finalists.
ReplyDeleteSpeaking of which, I may not have said this earlier but when I already knew Manchester would get through the semis it was the weirdest experience in the world to watch them against Lincoln. I kept wondering when they were going to catch up, and thrash Lincoln, and began to doubt my memory once Lincoln had gone so far ahead! How'd they manage to get from nearly losing to convincingly making the semis? Weird.
Indeed James. I don't think many of us could've foreseen all this success going on that first round performance alone. But they've more than made up for it since, and their success is definitely not undeserved.
DeleteA devilish music round. I doubt that many, even music students, have even heard of Mily Balakirev, let alone able to identify his music, and Borodin isn't exactly a household name either. I think I'd have tried for Manchester's strategy with those bonuses!
ReplyDeleteWe were on the opposite side to James in this respect - we never met St. George's, but had been bumping into Manchester (and UCL; they played both us & manchester on the same day) throughout. We weren't there to see this one but were generally cheering on Manchester whenever we watched them, they were a nice lot (also there was some anti-UCL solidarity after our respective defeats!).