Evening all. Rather tiring day for me, as I have begun a year long internship at Aberdeen University, where I'll be working for the coming term. As I'm technically staff rather than student, I won't be trying to put a UC team together I'm afraid, but I may see if I can drum up interest somehow. Anyway, on with tonight's show.
Liverpool University was founded in 1881 as a university college; the building material used in its construction gave rise to the term 'red brick university'. Alumni include Lytton Strachey and Nick Grimshaw. The uni sent a side last year, who trounced Keele in the first round, but couldn't maintain enough of that form for Round 2, where they surprisingly lost to Cardiff. This year's quartet were:
Ben Mawdsley, from Southport, studying Astrophysics
Jim Davis, from Gullane near Edinburgh, studying Tropical Disease Biology
Captain: Dachman Crew, from Liverpool, studying Biochemistry
Hugh Hiscock, from Southampton, studying French
Sheffield University was also founded as a university college, in 1897, and became a university in 1905. Alumni include Hilary Mantel, Eddie Izzard, David Blunkett MP and my uncle Tom. It last sent a team back in 2010-11, which included LAM readers Andy Bolton, Tristam Cole and Hugh 'HughTube' Bennett; they reached the semis before surprisingly losing to York. This year's team were:
Andrew Trueman, from Hartlepool, studying Medicine
Nathaniel Aspray, from Basingstoke, studying Medicine
Captain: Jonathan Cunliffe, from Solihull, studying Medicine
Claire Greenwood, from Bedford, studying Medicine
Paxo helpfully informed us that Mr Cunliffe was Mr Aspray's best man at his wedding!
Off we set again then, and it was Mr Hiscock who struck first, and his side took two of the resultant bonuses. Sheffield followed shortly afterwards, but they could only manage one of theirs. Liverpool seemed to do better in the early stages; after the first picture round, on tournament trees of Wimbledon singles tournaments, the Merseysiders led 50-15.
Sheffield fought back with the next starter, but only got one bonus on cricket, which Mr Cunliffe admitted to knowing little about! Liverpool were soon back in command though, and took a full set of bonuses on relative sizes of EU nations through, what may have been, a series of guesses. They were definitely guessing on a later set on holograms; when asked for a Russian physicist, they could only come up with 'Vladimir Putin'!
The music round, on classical pieces featured in the Die Hard film trilogy, went to Liverpool, and their lead now stood at 120-30. Sheffield needed to get moving again, and did so with a question on their home subject of medicine; one bonus on HTML colours followed. But Liverpool weren't going to let them back in, and took two on a set of bonuses on paradoxes, including the amusingly named 'Trigger's broom' paradox!
The second picture round, on musicians portrayed in films, went to Sheffield, but they couldn't convert any of the bonuses, which meant their deficit now stood at 140-55. Now, though, the Steelmen began to build up a head of steam on the buzzer, and began to eat away into the deficit. Though they didn't seem to be converting many bonuses, the starters alone were enough to pull them back within touching distance.
With just minutes to play, Sheffield had broken 100 and cut the gap to just 20, and an unlikely come-from-behind win looked possible. But Jim Davis thought otherwise, and took another starter to give Liverpool more breathing space. Just one bonus followed, but when the next starter was dropped, it looked like it would do. Sheffield managed the final starter, but couldn't go any further; at the gong, Liverpool won 155-130.
A match that moved slowly most of the way through, then picked up late on. Bad luck to Sheffield, whose score will probably not be enough for the repechage, but we shall wait and see; a fair performance nonetheless. Well done to Liverpool, but they may need to up their game next time; best of luck to them for that next time.
Hugh Hiscock was the best buzzer of the night, getting six starters for Liverpool, while Messrs Trueman and Aspray got three each for Sheffield. On the bonuses, Liverpool converted 13 out of 27, and Sheffield just 8 out of 25, which is what lost them the game. There were no penalties again though, which is good.
Next week's match: Bath vs Glasgow
Also tonight, Only Connect began its much anticipated BBC2 run. Didn't see a great deal of the match, but it will be interesting to see how the UC QF system, apparently still being used, will work with double the amount of shows.
Just FYI on the OC format. My understanding is that, with 27 shows, it's just going to be two of the previous 13-episode series formats, and then with a final between the two 'winners' of each half (if you see what I mean).
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