Withington Pub Quiz League - Quizbiz 08/02/23

Prodigals just nick their KFD showdown to earn a WIST final slot against Albert who beat the Railway; in the Lowly Grail the Opsimaths and the History Men reach the final

... and for those of you who've missed him (i.e. all of us) at the foot of this page I've published Gerry Collins' latest sideways glance at the WithQuiz world

WIST Champions Cup Semi Finals

KFD lost to Prodigals

Railway lost to Albert

WIST Lowly Grail Semi Finals

Charabancs lost to Opsimaths

History Men beat Bards

Inscrutable cat

(R4/Q2)

WIST Champions Cup Semi Finals

KFD lost to Prodigals

Yet another nailbiter - and this time KFD are on the wrong end

In this 'all WithQuiz' semi our top two teams were pitted against each other and yet again KFD were involved in a very close finish. This time. however, it was the Prodigals who snuck off with the honours, winning by just a single point down in Heaton Mersey.

So this year's WIST final on May 3rd will be between the Prodigals and Albert.

Hard act to follow, Chris?

(R1/Q25)

Railway lost to Albert

Albert end Stockport's WIST dreams for another year, edging past the Railway

Mike has some problems with students...

A very competitive encounter. As usual these days Albert fared better on the Stockport section than the Withington part. But the scores were close all the way through. It is fair to say that both teams found the Withington rounds better suited to conferring since the teams managed just 6 twos between them. We felt the Railway got the harder questions. There was some puzzlement about how Estudiantes fitted the theme. perhaps someone can explain.

(ED: Yes, I think I can explain, Mike. There was the same query in our match but then Nick realised that 'Plata' means 'silver' in Spanish and the full name of the football team in the answer was 'Estudiantes de La Plata'.)

Yes, Vladimir!

(R5/Q3)

WIST Lowly Grail Semi Finals

Charabancs lost to Opsimaths

The Charas just couldn't keep their victory march going so the Opsis reach the final

Mike reports from the privileged 'KDB bench' position...

I was spectating this week as Nick, Howell, Brian and Emma vanquished the Chara team of Damian, John, Graham and Gerry.

It was great having Emma back in our line up and when it came to the final pop music 'biggest streamer' round she was worth her weight in 'La Plata'.

Most delighted face of the evening goes to John for correctly working out (guessing?) the number of feathers on a shuttlecock.

Jane acted as QM and navigated some ticklish situations with fairness and composure. In particular the final round caused a headache because 1971 appeared amongst the questions but was not listed at the head of the round - and 1977 was listed at the head of the round but was not in the questions. We chose to ignore the list at the top of the round - hope this was right.

Good too to see Gerry in the Chara team and get a chance to thank him for turning his pen once more to contribute a piece for the site (see the foot of this page).

Zsa Zsa, Magda and Eva

Hungary for husbands

(R3/Q2)

History Men beat Bards

Happy days for Ivor - the History Men reach another final

Ivor spills his views, as well as the stats, from the Parrswood...

Young David was away. It was his work Christmas party - not sure if it was a late 2022 or an early 2023 one, but it probably makes sense to have enforced merriment in a restaurant’s quiet season. At least the vegetables are likely to be cooked and the meal served up within two hours. Vanessa was also unavailable, so it was time to dig deep into our reserves of talent (Mrs C and her brother Ray) and, like a first cuckoo call of the spring, the return of Mike H to QM duties. We were the home team though of course this was a 'derby' cup game and so we had to provide the QM. This was just as well for the Bards as Tony was only able to raise three players tonight. We bagged our lucky seats, lost the toss, installed Anne in 'easy' seat four (which proved not so easy), and, after a firm team talk not to underestimate the prowess of even a depleted Bards side, set off in our effort to reach a European final (albeit only of the second rank).

We won the first round 25-19; the Bards took the second 9-11; we extended our lead in the first two WithQuiz-style rounds to 7 points, but, as is our wont, we wobbled and only just managed to stop a spirited rally by the Bards in the last round. Like Waterloo it was "a close damn’d thing". The quiz was very well balanced. For stats lovers (probably no one) in the Stockport 30 questions there were 20 twos, six unanswereds (splitting 3-3 between the two teams) and four steals (3-1 to Historymen). In the WithQuiz half the Bards won 19-18 and there were six twos (3-3), eight steals (4-4) and only one unanswered (going to the Historymen).

Quiz paper set by...

...The Stockport League (Greg Spiller)

Average Aggregate score 106.5

Good scores beating the average aggregate achieved in the Quarter Finals back in November by over 10 points. Plenty of variety and themes to boot. I particularly liked the WithQuiz themed rounds using foreign language colours and words without vowels - although Grindr and Abrdn do seem to contain vowels which rather spoilt things.

In the Written Round (Round 2) there was some debate over La Paz being excluded. We understand that Bolivia splits its capital between La Paz and Sucre so I guess La Paz was omitted from the list of 'L' capitals since it is only 'half a capital'. I had a bash on my own at this list from my spectating position. La Paz was the least of my problems - I forgot to include London! Perhaps a sign of things to come? Legislative moved to Manchester; executive based in Hull; judiciary up north in Newcastle; oligarchs to stay in London. Why not?

...so what were Ivor's views?...

Greg compiled (in my opinion as a winning captain) an excellent test of knowledge -and occasionally the lack of it. The naming of capital cities starting with 'L' lent itself well to the written format (as opposed to 10 random questions). That would have been Young David’s specialist round - I think he was even born in Lusaka - and he knows all these modern names. No point remembering Lourenco Marques for quiz lists these days.

I particularly liked the physicist round (Tony might disagree) and the foreign colours round. We did flag a bit at the end, possibly due to alcohol, but cup ties are always longer given the format. At least we didn't need extra time, or worse, the penalty shoot-out. The real delight of any quiz, however, is dragging up a correct answer especially one you didn't even know was right or indeed how you might have ever known it. Ray’s “Fastnet”, Alison’s “Rebecca West”, and my “syzygy”.

The opposite of delight is when the team or individual zigs instead of zags to concede a steal - unless it is the opposition in which case there is a frisson of schadenfreude. At least tonight there were no blurts; blurts couple schadenfreude from the opposition with one's own team's derision. No wonder we need alcohol to settle our nerves in the quizzing world.

Question of the Week

This week the vote goes to Round 1 Question 29 with a recommendation that Suella Braverman studies it carefully ...

Who wrote the poem New Colossus that contains the words:

"Give me your tired, your poor, Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free”

...that are inscribed on the Statue of Liberty?

For the answer to this and all the week's other questions click here.

One for Suella to ponder

(R1/Q29)

Megsit 3 years on - The Real Story

If it's a Wednesday night, it must be a different planet

Let’s get one thing clear. WithQuiz in real life is nothing like it is on the telly. The thirty minutes or so spent watching the recorded highlights of mindless trivia that countless millions tune into every Wednesday night immediately after the climax of Naked Attraction can easily be reclaimed; just rig the alarm clock to go off half an hour later than usual and saunter into work a bit on the late side the next afternoon. In contrast, the three hours or so that the real WithQuiz experience takes will never, or can never, be reclaimed in this lifetime. In fairness there is rarely any coercion. Nor are any animals ever harmed. The participants are for the most part consenting adults who give up their time freely. And suffer freely.

How do I know? Reader, I went back. Nigh on three years since Megsit. It is always awkward for an ex-addict to go back. Though I have to say that it wasn’t as bad as I feared it might be. Far more relaxed than going back to AA meetings thanks mainly to the infinitely superior choice of drinks on offer and a lot less intimate than the embarrassing debacle that was my return to the downstairs broom cupboard of MANSAC (Manchester Sex Addiction Clinic) - probe all you want here, my lips are firmly sealed.

It’s a feckin quiz venue so I should have been expecting the constant barrage of questions: "How long did it take you to dig the tunnel?", "What’s it like out there?", "Do you have to wear a tag?", "Do people beat you up in night clubs when they find out you don’t play in a quiz team?", "What is your favourite landlocked country?" Enough I say. No more questions.

At which point everyone freezes. Panic sets in. Within ten minutes my words are hurtling across the WithQuiz grapevine. NO MORE QUESTIONS! Those were his exact words. I was in the room when he said it. NO MORE QUESTIONS. This is worse than global warming…. What the feck are we going to do now? Has anyone saved a few spares? Can we outsource? This is a feckin calamity.

James was the only one to keep a clear head. He arranged a hurried petition and later that night buttonholed his local MP demanding immediate action. Her reply has subsequently been leaked to the Telegraph and has been interpreted by most political pundits as being 'non-conciliatory in the extreme'. In essence she is said to have advised him to get a life and, failing that, to gather up all his quiz books off the floor and feck off to the spare bedroom.

In truth there is little evidence to support this panic in the taproom. Certainly, on the evening that I attended, question stocks were more than adequate. They even managed to stash away a few spares for future emergencies such as a Truss-led counter-coup taking over the reins of power again. If anything it was answers that seemed to be in short supply. One anonymous veteran from my old team, the Charabancs, complained of being sent into battle every week with an allocation of just seven serviceable answers. “Small wonder that we lose every week when we have to play the final six rounds firing blurts or even making answers up as we go along”, said the clearly frustrated whistle-blower as he wet his whistle at the bar.

Given these rumblings of discontent why does Match of the Night continue to top the ITV ratings?

“I think it is largely a matter of placement”, said Mike, who has produced the show for more than forty years now. I think the punters tune in for Naked Attraction, binge themselves silly on the sofa and are then too knackered to turn the telly off before we come on. That’s what happens in my household anyway. Or it might be because viewers are seduced by the glamour of quiz evenings. Don’t forget that the telly can make anything look glamorous if it just shows edited highlights. Look at Manchester United for example. Of course the reality is tawdry. But on the telly you don’t see the gaping flies and the weeping mascara as the contestants dash back from the loo to answer their question. Or smell the Brut aftershave mingled with the whiff of Deep Heat and Grecian2000 that inevitably pervades any room where men of a certain age come together. Or hear the constant slurping and blurting and burping and bickering and scrunching of crisps packets that accompanies any live quiz that I have ever attended. When we are there we recognise and accept the bleakness of our reality; hard not to when you are sat in the Stadium of Murk in drizzly Ladybarn. But to the punter at home in Droylsden this is Hollywood, folks, the US of A. And them lucky bastards are living the dream.

It’s not a bad night out. I might go back again some time. I might even pop back and see all the gang at Gamblers Anonymous. But I wouldn’t bet on it.

(For anyone who has never attended a proper quiz before, WithQuiz comes into season in late September and lasts until the cows come home)