Wednesday, January 27, 2016

26 January–Home to the Dolphin.



The Lemmings started the second half of the season with a home game against the Dolphins – on the previous occasion the Lemmings had lost by over 20 points and were hoping to do much better this time, lifting themselves from the bottom of the table.
The questions had been well vetted, only one being challenged: “Which county cricket team plays its home games at New Road” with the given answer Leicestershire (Q2 in Sport) – in fact the answer New Road Worcester - 2 - aerial - geograph-1609995.jpgshould be Worcestershire and the setters became the bête noir of the evening. But in fact, the error crept in at the vetting stage when a question already asked recently was removed and replaced with this one.
The evening was not without humour, in particular in relation to the refining of pig iron (Q33 General Knowledge) – the Dolphins helpfully explained that it entailed extracting slag from the pig iron; Bob replied “Keep tarts and cops out of this” to general merriment.
The Lemmings got off to a good start winning the Specialist rounds with 65 points to the Dolphin’s 58 – things were looking up!!
But things then returned to normal and the slender lead was eaten into until it gradually disappeared into the the Dolphin’s maw as they took the General Knowledge rounds with 96 to the Lemmings’ 75. Final score 154 to 140 to the Dolphin – a smaller gulf than our previous meeting but enough!!
Individual scores were Bob 15/18, Wendy 15/21, Nick 9/3 and Tomo 12/15 – conferred points were 8/15 and 6/3 pass-overs. The Dolphin picked up- 4/7 pass-overs.

Brian provided a fine selection of filled bread rolls to round off a very pleasant evening with special thanks to him, to the visitors and to Mark who as question master kept a light hand on proceedings with humour.

8 comments:

AAD said...

Yes, did the questions from home and picked out the New Road error, ironic given the fine cricketing stock of the Chester Road Tavern. Some vague memory of GCSE History and the Industrial Revolution also helped the name Henry Cort come back to mind - amidst all the confusion of Darby, Arkwright, Hargreaves etc that seemed to feature heavily last week.

Thought both sets were pretty good - although I tended to perform far better with the earlier questions of the round (especially player 2 first-first) and thought that player 4s might not have enjoyed things too much.

In my absence (coincidentally or causally?) the Robin were able to edge out the Rams to achieve what will certainly be our only "double" of the season - setting things up nicely for the chance to avenge the Lemmings a fortnight hence. In between sits our night of Question Setting - I shall reach for my helmet and flak-jacket.

Unknown said...

Does anyone really think that asking for the name of an obscure footballer who holds the record for own goals in the Premiership is a question for a "general" knowledge round? Sad football anorak round maybe.

MW said...

The Richard Dunne question was a tricky one and for us multi-generation Manchester City supporters, it also brought back some memories. Where were we when we were s**t? We were there!

I've been having flashbacks about some of those goals ever since Tuesday...

As we were asking questions this week though, I didn't get to answer that one, or indeed any of the others.

I must hold my hand up to the incorrect New Road / Leicestershire cricket question – that wasn't down to the Chester Road Tavern at all. When we were doing the final vetting, we changed quite a few questions around in both sets after many people had checked them over, particularly in the Sport round. I put in the "New Road" question to replace a Gary Anderson / Darts question that was originally in there but which we had last week. I know that Worcestershire play at New Road but in a moment of something or other that I can’t remember, I’ve just typed the wrong answer in! Mea culpa…

I think that was the only manifestly wrong answer this week, although some of the other questions were tricky indeed. I was asking at the Waters Green and some scoresheets had landed in the psychedelic bag before I left and teams generally seemed to have scored pretty well. Time will tell what the final verdict says.

AAD said...

I got Richard Dunne, I think it is fairly well-known amongst local football fans and the Q did signpost it by mentioning his clubs.

Not exactly "GK", but I think it would have been appropriate in a Sport round. I wager that it was successfully answered more frequently than at least half of the sport questions this season (though I wouldn't want anyone to try to assess this claim!) - at least on conferral, I would imagine that there are few teams without one soccer-literate participant (as opposed to many other sports).

Roy Keane's Right Hook said...

You don't need to be a "sad football anorak" as Mr Levitt puts it to know the Richard Dunne answer. Most fans of Premier League football would answer that qusetion without hesitation as it is a well known fact. I suspect if Mr Levitt had his way all football questions would be banned. How he thinks this is not "general" knowledge is beyond me. If we're going down that route then half the questions set every week should be thrown out.

Unknown said...

As RKRH says, fans of Premier League football might know the answer but the majority of the population, who have no interest in football, wouldn't. It's a Sport round question at best

AAD said...

Is there any single thing that the majority of the population have any interest in? Not sure how Pointless sample the "public" but questions such as naming 20thC Prime Ministers tend to show widespread ignorance of real "basics".

Not sure that I fancy a GK round shorn of Sport/Art/Entertainment/Geography/History/Science. Nor is there a solid argument for saying that GK questions on these topics need to be more accessible than the specialists. Unlike Mastermind, where the specialists are pitched at self-proclaimed experts, the same people who get the GKs get the Specialists. An impenetrable question is a pain in the neck regardless of where it appears. I suspect too much of a break with tradition and too boring for 6 people at a time, and too pressurised for the other two, but if specialists have any reason to be tougher, then perhaps each team should nominate a player to take the whole of two rounds each, Eggheads style?

Tbh, not sure that the Specialists achieve that much compared to having 144 GKs, other than to ensure a minimal number of questions on major topics and to allow the opportunity for teams to provide, at best, entertaining themed rounds and, at worst, ultra-narrow pet obsessions.

Anonymous said...

Of course sports questions can be asked in the GK section, just not to many please!
JS