Evening all. So, the semi-finals have arrived once again. No room for error now: if you win, you're in the final; if you lose, you're out. Both of tonight's team had impressed in their prior matches; the difference being, one had come straight through, the other had taken the longest route possible.
Corpus Christi College Cambridge were the straight through comers, defeating Merton of Oxford in the first round, Magdalen of Oxford in the second, Wolfson in the preliminaries, and fellow semi-finalists Trinity in the qualifiers. They were unchanged from those previous matches:
Alexander Russell, from Bristol, studying Japanese Studies
Will Stewart, from Peterborough, studying History of Art
Captain: Ian Wang, from Sale in Greater Manchester, studying English
Alex Gunasekera, from Witney, studying Chemistry
Durham lost to the same Trinity team in the first round, came through the play-offs by beating York, then defeated Southampton in the second round and Jesus in the preliminaries, lost their qualifier to fellow semi-finalists Imperial before winning their play-off against Wolfson. They too were the same four as before:
Charles Bland, from Sutton in Surrey, studying Philosophy
William Tams, from Kirkby Stephen in Cumbria, studying Biosciences
Captain: Joe Cooper, from London, studying Chemistry
Arthur Raffle, from Manchester, studying French and German
Off we set again then, and Mr Cooper got the final matches of the series underway with the first starter of the night; bonuses on Gertrude Stein gave the Wearsiders a full house to start with. Corpus Christi followed them off the mark with Mr Stewart doing the honours, and two bonuses on evolutionary theory were taken. Mr Wang gave his side the lead by taking the next starter, and a full house of bonuses on rain in art suddenly gave them a 20 point lead. The Cambridge captain took a second starter in a row, and a second full set in a row was taken. The first picture starter was dropped; the bonuses, on Java codes, went to Corpus Christi, who did well to take one of a very tricky set of bonuses. They now led 85-25.
And on they carried with Mr Stewart doing the honours of the next starter with 'Margarey of Anjou'; bonuses on the work of John McWhorter gave the Cambridge side two correct answers. Mr Cooper finally hauled Durham some more points with 'garlic'; two bonuses on sci-fi literature went to the Wearsiders. Mr Bland then gave them a second starter in a row, and another pair of bonuses took them back to within touching distance.
The music starter was quickly taken by Mr Gunasekera; the bonuses, on pairs of pieces by composers one of whom taught the other, saw the Cambridge side take one correct answer (and provided a nice link back to the early days of this blog with Ravel and Vaughan Williams, previously linked in the first round match of our friend James Gratrex). Corpus Christi now led 120-65, and Mr Wang increased the lead with a quick buzz on the next starter; bonuses on places one would encounter in a straight journey from the Vatican to Mecca gave them two correct answers. A very complicated mathematical starter was then worked out by Mr Gunasekera, prompting his captain to exclaim "B***** H***!" and even Paxo was impressed by it! Films released 50 years ago this year gave a full house, and gave the Cambridge side a 100 point lead and one foot in the final. Mr Bland pulled one back for Durham with 'Mahogany'; just the one bonus went the Wearsiders' way, leaving them needing a shutout to catch up in the final straight.
The second picture round, on cosmopolitanist philosophers, went to Durham; two correct answers took the scores to 165-100, and just about kept them in it. But when Mr Stewart took the next starter, that likely put the game beyond reach, even though the Cambridge side ended up missing all three bonuses.
Durham still gave it a go though, Mr Cooper taking the next starter, and one bonus on the execution of Charles I went with it. Mr Wang confirmed his side's win by quickly taking the next starter; no bonuses followed again, but it didn't really matter at this point. Mr Tams took the final starter for Durham; they quickly answered the first bonus and the gong cut off their conferring of the second. Corpus Christi won 185-130.
A good first semi-final between two good teams, bravo them clapping each other at the start and end (and to the teams who've been doing that throughout the series in fact). Unlucky Durham, but a great run of performances to get here, no shame in going out now, thanks very much indeed for taking part! Very very well done Corpus Christi though, another good win over good opponents, and very very best of luck in the final!
The stats: Mr Wang was the best buzzer of the night with four starters, while Mr Cooper was best for Durham with three, though Mr Raffle was their best in the series overall with 23. On the bonuses, Corpus Christi converted 17 out of 33, while Durham managed 12 out of 20.
Next week's match: the second semi-final, between Imperial and Trinity
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