University Challenge 2019-20: Round 2: Match 7: Wolfson vs Edinburgh

Evening all. A dull night here, what with the wet and windy weather outside; but then, it is January, so what do we expect?! At least we have Death in Paradise back on Thursdays to cheer us up! And the newly expanded Quizzy Mondays too; I'm honestly surprised it took until this year for someone to come up with that idea. On with tonight's UC then, and the penultimate second round match.

Wolfson College Oxford just scraped through one of the matches of the first round, as they drew 170-each with the excellent Sheffield side and won on a tie-breaker. They were the same four as before: 
Mike Perrin, from East Anglia (via Japan), studying Maritime Archaeology 
Mary Caple, from Victoria, Canada, studying Art History 
Captain: Claire Jones, from Houston, Texas, studying History 
Ryan Walker, from Stone in Staffordshire, studying Clinical Medicine

Edinburgh, the defending champions, had a more comfortable victory first time around, as they led throghout and easily defeated Birkbeck of London 165-90. They were also unchanged from before: 
Richard Moon, from North London, studying Classics
Adam McLauchlan, from Edinburgh, studying Chemistry
Captain: Emma Williams, from Brighton, studying Linguistics
Isaac Stevens, from Sutton Coldfield, studying German and History

Off we set again then, and a very quick buzz from Ms Jones opened the scoring for the night; composers as described in the book 'Conversations with Stravinsky' provided the first bonus set, of which two were correctly taken. A penalty gave Edinburgh the chance to follow them off the mark, but they couldn't take the chance. Another starter was dropped, before Ms Jones eventually took a second; one bonus on Ovid's Metamorphoses was taken. Edinburgh finally got off the mark, Mr Moon doing the honours with 'Henry Adams'; a pair of bonuses on English trees followed. The first picture round, on board game boards at the start of a game, went to Wolfson; another single bonus gave them a lead of 45-20.

A slip-up from Edinburgh allowed the impressive Wolfson captain to take a fourth starter of the still young match; just the one bonus was taken with it this time. Mr McLauchlan pulled back for Edinburgh with 'statins'; bonuses on pop music inspired by literature saw the Scots side also take a single bonus and give educated guesses of songs by the artists in question on the other two they didn't know. Ms Jones didn't take long to pull back though as she took the next starter, giving the Oxonians a bonus set on manga, of which they, again, took just the one bonus. Mr Moon bit back for Edinburgh as he spotted 'Under' to be the word linking works listed; just the one bonus followed again. The teams were doing perfectly good on the buzzers at the moment, but neither was really following through on the bonuses.

Mr Perrin was first to identify Neptune from Holst's 'The Planets' for the music starter; the bonuses, on classical pieces prominantly featuring the celeste, providied, again, just the one correct answer, taking their lead to 90-45. Some more vanished off it when Ms Williams took the next starter; bonuses on John Masefield gave them two correct answers (one of which I remembered featuring in one of our friend Jim Gratrex's matches back in the day!). Wolfson responded with Ms Jones taking her latest starter and going one better on the bonuses on the Chatham House Prize, a full set. Back came Edinburgh thanks to Mr Moon; a single bonus on Agatha Christie follow, but when Mr McLauchlan took the next starter, and a full set of bonuses English place name elements was taken, they were now just ten behind.

The second picture round, on depictions of the artist's childhood home, went to Wolfson; two correct bonuses upped their lead to 135-105 going into the home straight. The next starter asked for the African team that lost to Turkey in the 2002 World Cup QFs and went out of the 2018 tournament on fouls committed; I knew it to be Senegal long before Ms Jones correctly offered it. A full set of bonuses on Herodotus put them within sight of victory.

And when Ms Jones took the next starter, identifying the apple and the raspberry as the two fruits that follow 'Golden' to give names of awards, you suspected that was game over. One bonus followed, before the Wolfson captain confirmed the victory with 'Iran'; a full house took them up to 200. Mr Stevens did the right thing and had a punt on a decade the next starter, but only managed to lose five on a technical interruption; Ms Jones, for once, shot wide of the mark too. She did take the final starter of the match though; two bonuses followed and the third was cut off by the gong. Wolfson won 220-100.

Another good enjoyable contest. Unlucky Edinburgh, who were very much in it until the final third, but a respectable effort, thanks very much for playing! Very well done Wolfson though, Ms Jones especially, and very best of luck in the QFs, where, I'm guessing, they'll play next week's winners.

The stats: Ms Jones ended the night with TEN(!) starters, the best single match tally of the series thus far, while Mr Moon was best for Edinburgh with three. On the bonuses, Wolfson converted 21 out of 35 (with one penalty), while Edinburgh managed 10 out of 18 (with two penalties).

Next week's match: Corpus Christi vs Magdalen (such a shame this has to be a knockout match)

Only Connect began its play-off matches tonight with the Electrophiles vs the Suits. Thankfully, a slightly lenient allowance made no difference to the final score, a comfortable win for the latter, 19-11.