OK, so, a day later than I planned, we're here at Match 5. Playing tonight were the Edinburgh Scrabblers, Melanie Beaumont, Alan Sinclair and Simon Gillam, and the Solent Scrabblers, Noel Turner, Elisabeth Jardine and Penny Downer.
So, the first round. Edinburgh went first, and chose Beta: we saw 'Bowl', then 'Cistern', then 'Brook' and finally 'Beagle'; they had nothing, but Solent spotted they all end in the names of birds. Great question! For their own question, Solent chose Epsilon, and saw 'Clementine', then 'Greengage', then 'Boysenberry' and spotted fruit named after people. They saw the final clue 'Cox's Orange Pippin', which confirmed it for one point. Edinburgh chose Alpha, and saw 'Jan Hus', then 'William Tyndale', then 'Thomas Cranmer', and began to think these were all burnt at the stake; 'Joan of Arc' confirmed it for one point. Solent chose Gamma next, and got the picture round: we saw some Roman coins, then some mushrooms, then Frankie Howard in Up Pompeii and finally two skiers; they suggested a Roman connection, but this was wrong. The connection was a double I, apparantly, the coins being Dinarii and the mushrooms Shittake. For their final choice, Edinburgh chose Delta, and saw 'Jordan', then 'Lazerus', then 'Scone' and finally 'Biblioll'; they guessed 'stone', which was wrong, and it went over to Solent, who didn't know either. These are all fictional Oxford colleges, as in Jordan College Oxford, created by Philip Pullman. Left with Zeta and the music round, Solent heard two pieces of music, 'All in the April Evening', and then 'Morning', and this was enough for them to buzz in with 'times of the day' for three points. Well worked out. At the end of the round, Solent led 5-1.
On to the second round. Edinburgh went first again, and chose Alpha: '1902', then '1911', and they thought of coronations; they guessed '1953', as the year of the current Queen's coronation, and were right for three points. Solent chose Beta, and got the pictures: a white horse, then a brown horse and then a black horse; they guessed wrongly, as did Edinburgh. These are the Steeds of the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse, so a pale horse would be fourth, apparently. Edinburgh went for Delta next, and got another number sequence: '00001', then '00100'; they latched on to a binary connections, and decided to guess '10000', on the grounds that these are the binaries of the square numbers. This earned them another three points. Solent chose Epsilon: '5 C in a N', then '2 N in a D' and then '2½ D in a Q'; they didn't know, nor did Edinburgh. The connection is US coinage, so so '4 Q in a D' would be next, apparently. Edinburgh chose Zeta for their final question: 'Shoe', then 'Horse', then 'Rider'; they didn't know it. Solent did; it's 'battle'. 'For the want of a shoe, the horse was lost, for the want for a horse,' and so on. (Or, as Private Pike put it, 'for the want of a battle, the horse was nailed'!) Left with Gamma, Solent saw 'Sun, Moon and stars', then 'Sealife and birds', then 'Land animals and Man', and the thought this could be the order of Creation in the Bible. They couldn't think of an answer, nor could Edinburgh. The answer is Nothing (He rested), these being the final four days of Creation. At the end of the round, Edinburgh led 7-6.
On to the Walls. Solent chose the Alpha wall. After a bit of studying and some misses, they isolated 'Blanc', 'Brooks', 'B' and 'Smith' as famous Mels. After some more attempts, they locked 'Screwdriver', 'Hammer', 'Gimlet' and 'Wrench' as tools. They carefully studied the wall some more, and worked out the final sets: 'Sidecar', 'Manhattan', 'Gibson' and 'Margarita' are cocktails, and 'Puzzle', 'Business', 'Nuts' and 'Suit' can all be preceded by 'Monkey'. Well worked out for ten points.
Edinburgh were left with the Beta wall. They spent some time studying it and trying some groups unsuccessfully. With less than a minute to go, they still had nothing. They eventually isolated 'Angel', 'Fairy', 'Marble' and 'Madeleine' as cakes. They ran out of time before they could isolate any more. 'Spenser', 'Lawrence', 'Pope' and 'Pound' are all poets. 'Queen', 'Marlowe', 'Hammer' and 'Holmes are all fictional detectives. 'Victoria', 'Churchill', 'Horseshoe' and 'Reichenbach' are all waterfalls. They got all three of these links, which meant they scored five points. Going into the final round, Solent led 16-12.
It would all be up for grabs in Missing Vowels then. 'Shakespearean opening lines' went to Edinburgh 2-1 and 'Meteorological terms' went to them 3-1. 'Caribbean islands' was split 2-each. 'Latin legal phrases' went to Edinburgh 3-0, and that was time. Edinburgh just snuck home 22-20.
Another great match between two very well matched teams. Unlucky to Solent, but well played. Well done to Edinburgh, and we'll see them again when we get to the next round.
I'll be back with two more matches next week. See you then.
No comments:
Post a Comment