Only Connect - Match 7

Orienteers v. Romantics

Now, the Orienteers were Paul Beecher, Simon Spiro and Sean Blanchflower. I must apologized to Paul Beecher, since I am unable to provide any other quiz credits for him. Simon Spiro was very unlucky to score 27 in his 2012 Mastermind heat, and just miss out on a repechage slot. As for captain Sean, well, he is none other than a University Challenge series winner, with Trinity Cambridge, and the creator and proprietor of the finest website all about the series – which is one of my permanent links you can see opposite. Their opposition, the Romantics, I knew less about, but that doesn’t mean anything. Owen Rees, Phil Nelson and skipper Daniel Tuite took their name from their shared love of Romantic Composers. Let’s get on with the show.

Round One – What’s the Connection?

Right, the Tics kicked off with Two Reeds. – Tests Precious Metals- suggested a couple of things to me. Acid test? No that was something else. Touchstone? Maybe. Disney Distribution Label confirmed the Touchstone theory. Not for the Romantics, though, they quite understandably were thinking more of Buena Vista with the Disney one. The third was As You Like It’s wise fool. That was enough and they took the points. The Teers took twisted flax, which provided an early outing for the music set. I think all of us recognized Sinatra, but not the song he was singing for the first. Brass in Pocket by the Pretenders came next. Without the first that could either be metals or pockets. Alannis Morisette’s One Hand in my pocket confirmed it was the latter. The Teers had it at this point. Now, captain Daniel of the Tics courted disaster by not voicing the second vowel of Horned as he opted for the viper, but hey, it’s a free country. I liked this set very much. I didn’t get it from Peace (war) but I had it from Love (law and Order) These were Ministries from George Orwell’s 1984. The third was Plenty (Economic Affairs) and the fourth was the real clincher – Truth (news, entertainment and education). It looked like captain Daniel was fishing a bit when he tried 1984, but it worked. The Eye of Horus hid a picture set. The Teers didn’t recognize Lionel Blue for the first, but knew Jack Black for the second. Now, hang on a minute, I said to myself, colours has to be too easy for this one. Jack Straw was third, so that put the kibosh on colours. What could it be though? A rush of blood to the head saw the Teers try Jacks without taking the last clue. This gave the Tics Gaby Logan. Right, I thought, working on Gaby Logan, it’s more likely to be Logan than Gaby. So logan – Mount Logan? Loganberry? Hello, yes, berries. The Tics didn’t have it. This was one of those which really isn’t that obvious, until it’s pointed out, at which point you have an urge to slap your forehead and shout d’oh! Lion gave the Tics Messiah – too many possibilities with that one, methought. The Tics thought so too, going almost immediately for the second clue, Apocalypse. Hmm – I was struggling at this point. The Heist made me think of films as it did the Tics, but I would have taken another clue. The Tics didn’t, opting for Mel Gibson films. Nope. The Teers were shown the last clue – Russian Roulette, and they offered films about Vietnam. No. Apparently they were all Derren Brown TV specials. A good fair set, and come to think of it I did hear of the Russian Roulette one. No cigar for me though. Now, Water gave the Teers a really interesting set. The Brittas Empire offered too many trees to bark at. Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland gave me just an inkling that we might just be dealing with – it was all a dream -  here. Which was confirmed by Vanilla Sky in third. That was enough for the Teers, and Simon explained it for the points. That was enough for the Teers to lead by 4 – 3 at the end of the round.

Round Two – What Comes Fourth?

So to the round which usually separates the really good from the nearly good. Now, I know this is bragging, but I took a five pointer here with the Tics’ first choice. 2011: Dusseldorf, Azerbaijan was enough to give me 2014, Copenhagen, Austria. It’s all to do with the Eurovision Song Contest. In 2011 it was held in Dusseldoorf, and won by Ell and Nikki of Azerbaijan. This year it was held in Copenhagen, and won by Conchita Wurst. The Tics, to be fair to them, knew it was Eurovision from the off, but needed 2012: Baku, Sweden before supplying the correct answer. That’s not bad technique mind you, make sure of the points. Sean too gave us Horned rather than Hornèd Viper. Again, this was a chance at a five pointer. 1^st: Sighting made me think of close encounters. Now, the film only dealt with 3 kinds, but the 4^th I thought might be abduction, or some interchangeable term. The Teers were there from the start as well. They had the guts enough to gamble, and reaped their due reward for doing it. Very good shout. Water gave the Tics Flag of Mauritius. Now, this flag has 4 horizontal stripe. So presumably we were looking for something with one stripe, like a lance corporal. Adidas shoes for the second clue confirmed my hypothesis. Ironically corporal was the third clue. The Tics were wrong with their numbers, thinking of something with five rather than 1. This gave the Tics the bonus, and they like me went with lance corporal. Eye of Horus gave the Teers Gras – hmm, didn’t have a Scooby myself – Butter – and here I had an inkling. I knew that Grasmere and Buttermere are in the Lake District, which maybe suggested Winder for the answer. If Thirl was the third, it would definitely be that. It was, and sadly it did nothing to help the Teers. It helped the Tics though, who took the bonus. Twisted Flax gave the Tics – Poisoned. Too many possibilities here, but - stabbed by Prince Ludwig - clinched it. These were the fates of the various Edmund Blackadders. In Blackadder Goes Forth he goes over the top – and may have been killed, although it’s not totally clear. The Tics needed – Become Prince Regent  - to get the connection, and provide the correct answer. To finish off then the Teers had the Lion set and the pictures. We began with a green triangle, which meant but little to me. Then a red circle, and when you looked on the screen it immediately looked like the controls on a sony playstation. I knew square came 4^th, and my daughters screamed pink square. Neither team knew the colour of the square. This meant that the score at the end of the round going into the walls was 10 – 9 to the Teers, and we were in the throes of a good close contest.

Round Three – The Connecting Walls

The Teers chose Lion, and I could see both a set of football grounds with Road in their name, and places in Bedfordshire. Come to think of it there were also vans and Harry Potter characters too. The Teers began by trying to take out the Bedfordshire towns. This didn’t work at first, so then they showed admirably tenacity in juggling all the road options before finding the right combination of London, Bloomfield, Vicarage and Loftus. The Bedfordshire towns fell into place with Ampthill, Sandy, Dunstable and Flitwick. A little discussion ensued to make sure that they got the last two lines right on their first go, and that’s exactly what they did. The vans were transit – Luton – Sherpa and sprinter, leaving professors Sprout – Pomfrey - Snape, and Carrow (not a professor, but still member of the Hogwarts staff). Textbook. 10 points.

Water stayed with the Harry Potter theme, since I could see a set of owls from the books. There was also a set of aircraft carriers. Michael Jackson album titles sprang out, which left anagram of fish. I didn’t see that until captain Daniel pointed it out. The Tics kicked off by trying to take out the Michael Jackson albums. That didn’t work. Then the aircraft carriers, and that too didn’t work. The fish anagrams broke the log jam though, with Lose – Aunt – Bad and Tutor. Eliminating Bad enabled them to get Off The Wall – Thriller – Dangerous and Invincible. This left them to get Pigwidgeon – Hermes – Errol and Hedwig as the owls. The Aircraft carriers were Bulwark – Ark Royal – Indefatigable and Illustrious. Another excellent wall performance, and a well deserved ten points. It was anybody’s game going into the missing vowels, since the Teers led by 20 to 19.

Round Four – Missing Vowels

It was all down to this round, and the first set, popular game apps, fell 4 – 0 to the Teers. Female leaders and their countries increased the Teers’ lead, falling to them 3 – 1. Kurt Vonnegut novels provided a second four nil shut out for the Teers, and it was all over bar the shouting. Non Olympic Sports went 2 – 1 to the Teers. So at the end the score was 33 – 21. An emphatic scoreline considering how close that match was until the last round, and how well the Romantics played. Hard line, but they’ll be back. Well played Orienteers, especially that vowels round. Good show.