Well, yes, before you ask, I really
did enjoy having a really competitive set of specialist rounds in tonight’s
show. I couldn’t fault any of the contenders’ preparations for their rounds. I’ll
say more about that afterwards.
So let us really begin with Loretta
Waters. Loretta was offering us the films of Ewan McGregor. I surprised myself
by managing half a dozen of these, since I wouldn’t necessarily say that I’m a
Ewan McGregor fan. Oh, don’t get me wrong, a good actor, but not one to make me
stir from the Clark sofa when one of his films is on at the Odeon, if you know
what I mean. I venture to say that Loretta Waters is a lot more enthusiastic
about him since she managed a double figure score of exactly 10. Barring a
truly amazing round from one of the three contenders yet to come, she was going
to be in contention at half time.
As was John Cockerill. John was
offering British Race Courses. Now, sometimes you can tell when a contender is
well prepared, has confidence, is is going to tear their round up. I felt that
within three or four questions during John’s round. If you play in a range of
quizzes it can be quite useful to know a little bit about racecourses, and I
knew enough to know that John’s questions were certainly not all sitting ducks,
and this made the round of 12 even more impressive. If he could put on anything
like as good a performance in GK, I fancied we’d be seeing a high score from
him.
If Sree Kanthamneni was at all
daunted by the round which he had to follow he didn’t show it. World Heritage
Sites provided him with 11 points of his own, and once again this was a subject
that I know enough about to vouch for the fact that you’d really have to know
your stuff to get into double figures on it. So far we’d had three double figures
rounds, and three rounds with no passes. Were we about to make it a full house?
Well, almost. We certainly had
another double figures round from Ruth Russell-Jones, who answered questions on
the Shardlake novels of CJ Sansom. I have to admit that I have never read any
of these, although I did find that a general knowledge of Tudor History was
enough to bring three or four points as it was. However her 11 points was also
accompanied by a single pass, but not to worry about that.
So to the General Knowledge. Sadly
Loretta Waters’ challenge evaporated during her GK round. She never really
managed to get any momentum going, but never lost her cool, and finished the
round in one piece with 6 points for a total of 16. Sree Kanthamneni managed
double figures to take the target to 21. I have to say that sometimes you
watch, and when a contender gets an answer wrong, they are often very wide of
the mark stabs in the dark. What Sree didn’t know, by and large he made very intelligent
guesses on, and I felt he was a little unlucky not to post a few more.
Ruth Russell-Jones set about her
task, and it was by no means clear whether she would fall short of, or exceed
the total. In the end she did neither, equalling Sree’s GK score of 10 and 1
pass for a score 21. However Sree had just the one pass overall, while Ruth had
too, so if it went to countback, Sree would still have come out on top.
However, there was the little matter
of John Cockerill’s round first. I won’t lie, I do enjoy it when a contender
sits down in the chair in a businesslike manner, and sets about showing exactly
how it’s done in a GK round. Yes, John passed on a couple, but he did it
quickly, and never lost momentum in his round. Quick, concise answers and what
looked like some good sensible guesswork allowed him to pile up a score of 16,
thus giving him a commanding win by 7 points. That was a good performance, Sir –
best of luck in the semi finals.
The Details
Loretta Waters
|
Films of Ewan McGregor
|
10
|
0
|
6
|
4
|
16
|
4
|
John Cockerill
|
British Race Courses
|
12
|
0
|
16
|
3
|
28
|
3
|
Sree Kanthamneni
|
World Heritage Sites
|
11
|
0
|
10
|
1
|
21
|
1
|
Ruth Russell-Jones
|
The Shardlake Novels of C.J. Sansom
|
11
|
1
|
10
|
1
|
21
|
2
|
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