The Results

Getaways completed their campaign by scoring a memorable victory over SPW who (I'm assured) fielded their top team

Electric Pigs, behind throughout, with 4 questions to go honked forth to overwhelm the hapless History Men - an ominous portent for the forthcoming Val Draper Cup competition where Pigs usually fly.  Ivor writes in:

"The drama continues to the end of the season.  Our match against the Pigs was never going to be easy (our head to head results are pretty evenly balanced).  Only a win would be enough to hold on to fourth place (assuming our rivals succeed tonight) but it was not to be. A five point lead with 3 rounds to go was whittled away. Looking on the bright side we will not now face the Opsimaths in the first round of the cup.

The quiz was moderately hard with 13 unanswerables - 9 of them falling to the Pigs who nevertheless won by out-doing us in 2s by 10-5.

In mitigation we did have to contend with a couple of medical problems: neither of the medics nor, indeed, the optician in our side had heard of Babinski's syndrome of the eye; and Peter was bitten by a tsetse fly whilst in town earlier in the day and the quiz only just finished in time as he slumped asleep in his chair."

X-Pats finished on a low note losing at home (just) to Snoopy's Friends who now snatch 4th place in the table and thus qualify for next season's WIST Champions Cup

Charabancs of Fire cruised to a comfortable victory over the Opsimaths once they had bagged a 7 point advantage on the picture round - with SPW suffering a shock defeat at the Gateway, the Charas ended the league season just one measly point behind the mighty ones - a magnificent performance!!

TMTCH lost their last match at home to Ethel Rodin who, despite their victory, just lose out to Snoopy's on score difference in the battle for a place in next season's WIST Champions Cup

Question Paper - The Verdict

This week the questions were set by Albert.

Fine for most of the rounds but a big thumbs down (from me at least) for the picture round.  We went first and so had the first picture.  Well it was obviously Gordon Brown, so which dictator's uniform had been superimposed (well that seemed to be what the question was asking)?  Long discussions ensued.  Stalin, General Tito, someone from North Korea.  Eventually we settled for Enver Hoxha, the tyrant of Albania.  Much mirth from the others at the Swan.  "All together now", said Megson and his merry parishioners, "It's Gordon Brown!".  "Correct for a bonus point", said John the QM.  I felt I'd been tricked and cheated and duly went into a sulk.

Kieran's result email reflected similar bad vibes on the picture round.

From the Fletcher Moss Ivor adds:

"The quiz was moderately hard with 13 unanswerables - 9 of them falling to the Pigs who nevertheless won by scoring 10 2s to our meagre 5.  As to QotW: we quite liked the marriage quotation pairs though Tim’s nomination went to Round 6 Question 2  ('WNA' is Winter North Atlantic apparently)."

...and from Roddy at the Parrswood:

"We found the paper OKish but with a tad too many 'either you know it or you don't know it' type questions.  16 went unanswered by either side."

	'Question of the Week'
This week the vote comes from the Electric Pigs and goes to Round 6 Question 2: Where do the abbreviations TF, F, T, S, W and WNA appear one above another? For the answer to this and all the week's questions click here.

Mike Heale R.I.P.

Chatterbox

This week's round of matches complete the 2008/9 league season.

Next week the Charabancs will attempt to keep the WithQuiz flag flying in the WIST trophy.  They face Stockport's Tiviot team in the Semi Finals at the White Swan.  Please come along and offer Meggers and his flock the maximum support.  It's really important that the Final isn't a Stockport/Stockport affair (no pressure then, Gerry).

The following week (April 8th) we kick off a 4 week run of Val Draper Cup and Plate  knockout matches - starting with the eliminating Round in which the top 6 league teams get whittled down to 3.

Finally a reminder that the Cup and Plate Finals will take place on April 29th using a paper compiled from contributions from all the non-competing teams.  Each team captain therefore needs to be preparing 'a round and a pair' as their contribution in case they don't get through to the finals.

  Mike Heale

With the exception of our most recent newcomers, TMTCH, we all remember Mike Heale.  It is impossible not to remember him.  He made a deep impression on all who have joined in our Wednesday night tradition since the 1970s.  He loved the quiz league.  Apart from their final year of competition in 2005/6, his St Caths team were always there or thereabouts when it came to totting up the points.  Mike was a true polymath.  His approach to each quiz was gruff but scrupulously fair.  This made him a well-respected competitor.  When he railed against "bloody themes" and "those fancy Round Britain Quiz type questions" it was hard not to worry whether our question style wasn't going too far in the wrong direction.  His idea of a good quiz was 8 rounds of tough paired questions covering as wide a range of subjects as possible.; start prompt at 8.30pm and be ready for the after-match pints by 9.30pm - 10pm at the latest.

I, for one, have missed his presence since St Caths hung up their boots in 2006.  Rest in peace, Mike, and thanks for all you put into our league.

I've chosen a couple of photos from our end of season evenings to remind you of Mike.  God, he did enjoy winning that Val Draper Cup, didn't he? 

Winning the 2002/3 Val Draper Cup (Gary doing the honours)

"Yessssssss"