Mastermind 2019 - Semi Final 1

So at last we’ve reached the semi finals, dearly beloved. While acknowledging that first round form is not an infallible guide, it’s still quite fun to look over the form book before we get into the show. Here’s the first round performances of our first semi finalists:-

Nicholas Young	John Buchan	14	0	12	4	26	4
Sue Duffy	The Life and Works of Elizabeth Taylor	14	0	13	2	27	2
Roy Smith	Bob Marley	12	1	14	2	26	3
Mark Grant	Keith Douglas	14	0	15	0	29	0
Brian Davis	The Life of Henry VII	12	0	17	0	29	0

 No duffers in there. You’d think that the form guide suggested Mark and Brian were the ones to beat, but there really wasn’t a lot to choose between all five, bearing in mind that Nicholas’s GK was the lowest.

Nicholas it was who kicked us off. You may recall that Nicholas took part in heat 15, and when he returned to the black chair he only needed 5 points to win. Then he was answering on John Buchan, while last night he gave us the Life and Times of Samuel Johnson. 11 in a semi final specialist is a good, competitive total, and that’s what he produced. My score of 6 off a rather basic knowledge of Doctor Johnson suggested that this wasn’t necessarily a rock hard set of questions.

Next to go was Sue Duffy. Answering on Elizabeth Taylor, Sue had won heat 4, with a sterling performance on specialist giving her a lead which she maintained in the GK round. Last night she was answering on Anthony Powell’s 12 novel A Dance to the Music of Time series. Never having read any of them I can’t vouch for their difficulty, but I can vouch for the fact that 11 points and no passes is a very competitive score.

Roy Smith was actually 3^rd in Heat One back in October. That was a contest in which the two contenders who beat him both scored 16 on GK. Roy’s 14 wasn’t bad either. Back then he was answering on perennial favourite Bob Marley. Last night he was answering on Two Tone records. Yes, I was around in the late 70s and early 80s and remember them well. Not well enough to score more than 3 points, mind you. Roy did better than that. However at the end of the round he’d scored 7, and in a semi final, I’m sorry, 4 points behind is almost like half a lap in a 10,000m race. It was quite touching, really, as disappointment came over Roy’s face, and he was still sitting in the chair a little forlornly as the lights dimmed.

Many people have made Mark Grant, our next contender, a favourite for the series. This is totally understandable. It’s not that there aren’t many quizzers of the stature of Mark Grant in the series, although there aren’t, so much as there aren’t many quizzers of the stature of Mark Grant full stop. It would be a brave person who’d bet against Mark completing the Only Connect – Brain of Britain – Mastermind triple crown, like his Crossworders team mate Ian Bayley. He looked even more of a favourite when he put on a flawless 13 points on his specialist subject of The Festival of Britain.

This left Brian Davis. I recently saw Brian doing extremely well on Pointless. Brian took part in that remarkable heat 3, in which he was one of three contenders who posted scores of at least 29. That heat was won by Helen O’Connell, but Brian was runner up having scored a remarkable 17 on GK. Last night Brian was answering on William Wilberforce, and managed an excellent 12 to leave himself a point behind Mark.

Roy returned to the chair for the GK. Incidentally, for the semi finals we seem to have dumped the pointless gimmick of not telling the contenders how much each other has scored in the first round. Well and good. Roy had decided on the tactic of answering quickly and passing quickly. It worked for the first 4 questions, but a pass spiral soon developed and he only found another 4 right answers for the rest of the round. Well, look, Roy, you’re a Mastermind semi finalist and I know quite a few people who’d love to be able to add that to their own CV.

Nicholas Young struggled somewhat on his own GK round, and added 8 to his total. It’s all in the eye of the beholder, but I didn’t feel that any of the GK rounds were particularly strenuous in last night’s show. I had full houses in Nicholas, Mark’s and Brian’s rounds, which is undoubtedly easier to achieve on my sofa than in the black chair. Still, it did suggest that high scores were there for the taking, and sadly Nicholas’ wasn’t high enough.

Sue’s round, on the other hand, well Sue’s round was a very fine round indeed. She missed out on the same question I missed out on, but otherwise produced a perfect score of 14. The only other thing that did strike me about the round, though, was the time she took over several of the answers. This I felt opened the door for both Mark and Brian, who were definitely going to answer more quickly, I felt.

Brian did exactly that, and it’s well that he did, for he missed out on a couple which were gettable. Nonetheless his round had momentum right from the get go, and a fine string of correct answers brought him 13 points, which meant he was level with Sue on 25 and no passes. I still felt that Mark was going to win, but it did raise the mouthwatering prospect of a tie break.

Mark reeled off the first few answers. However his job was made harder after he hesitated over a question about aspic before giving it a guess, and then dropped another of the next couple of questions. After those couple though he powered onwards, and reached 13 for 26 and the win. Congratulations, sir, and best of luck in the final. As for Brian and Sue, well my heart goes out to the pair of you considering you both put in performances which were worthy of a place in the final. But that is the nature of a knockout competition I’m afraid. I hope that you can take consolation from a pair of very fine performances. Good show. I think we’ll be very lucky if all – or indeed any – of the other semi finals are as good as this one.

The Details

Nicholas Young	The Life and Times of Samuel Johnson	11	0	8	1	19	1
Sue Duffy	A Dance to the Music of Time by Anthony Powell	11	0	14	0	25	0
Roy Smith	2 Tone Records	7	2	8	5	15	7
Mark Grant	1951 Festival of Britain	13	0	13	0	26	0
Brian Davis	The Life of William Wilberforce	12	0	13	0	25	0