University Challenge 2024 Bangor v. Edinburgh

The Teams

Bangor

Nihal Bhatt

Katie Barnes

Jack Cunliffe (capt.)

Luke O’Hagan

Edinburgh

Matt Stafford

Frances Hadley

Arun Uttamchandani (capt.)

Matt McGovern

To a quizzer of a certain age, ‘Born in York in 1570 – “ which is how the first starter opened, this immediately flags up the name Guy Fawkes. It took both teams a moment or two more to process this before  Arun Uttamchandani buzzed in to pluck this particular unconsidered trifle. Bonuses on landmark experiments involving cohe picture starter common culinary plants amazingly saw me take a lap of honour for knowing that dephlogisticated air was the rather splendid name the Joseph Priestley gave to oxygen. No, of course I didn’t know the first. Mind you I knew all about Gregor Mendel and his peas. Edinburgh took the first and last. A list of films was given and Nihal Bhatt buzzed in to say they were all set in Boston. Both teams were now off the mark.  Bonuses on 60s and 70s music were a pretty easy set for an old codger like me, but the youngsters from Bangor couldn’t manage any of them. Right – what comes to mind when you hear the words Eurasian network of overland routes? Silk Road it was for me and silk road it was for Luke O’Hagen. This earned Bangor a set of bonuses on chess world champions and this set was far more to their liking. We both took a full house. The picture starter showed us the ensign of a navy of a European country. I’ll be honest, I didn’t have scooby which navy it belonged to. Neither did the teams. It was the Latvian Navy. Yeah, a little bit of a whythe’ell as a question. Fari play, I was impressed with Mat Stafford’s answer of neoplasticism for the architecture starter that followed. The 3 naval ensign bonuses that followed were thankfully a lot easier to identify than the Latvian one – at least they bore some reference to the national flags. I was surprised how long both teams dwelt on the metal with the lowest atomic mass. “Lithium?” I answered, not quite believing it might be so simple. It was, though. Luke O’Hagan chanced his arm with mercury, This let Arun Uttamchandani in with Lithium. This gave a set of bonuses on pairs of fictional works liked by words in their titles. Edinburgh took two. Luke O’Hagan recognised definitions of the word canon, and this brought a gettable set on island peaks. They messed up the second by giving a country rather than the island it’s part of, nonetheless they managed a pair. It was, at this stage, quite an even contest, with Edinburgh leading by 65 – 55.

Matt Stafford came in early on the next starter to identify places in Saudi Arabia. Subtitles of films in the MCU yielded a relatively simple full house, despite not including my favourite subtitle Thor: Seasiderok. The next question was about the kid of explanation that Sir Humphrey Appleby used to give in the beloved “Yes, Minister” – I give confidential briefings, you leak, he is being prosecuted under the Official Secrets Act.” Nobody knew that this is also called a conjugation. Matt Stafford worked out that the various definitions they were given were all pointing towards punt. Gobbledygook about chemical bonds saw us both take just the one with vitamin C. Arun Uttamchandani could see that the next starter was leading towards the word masala and this gave them a shott at bonuses on the work of engineer Mike Burrows. They took just the one. Nonetheless they were now comfortably into triple figures and were increasing the lead with each set. It was Arun Uttamchandani who was first to recognise the Ronettes with Be My Baby. Other tracks with drums played by Hal ‘Who’ Blaine brought Edinburgh two bonuses. Arun Uttamchandani, who was practically running the game at this point, knew the answer polymerase to a question I didn’t understand. Leading figures of Dadaism brought another brace of bonuses. Poor Bangor couldn’tt buy a starter at this point. Jack Cunliffe did exactly what he should, and buzzed early for the next starter to put Edinburgh off their stride. Sadly it was too early and allowed Edinburgh a free shot at goal. Frances Hadley knew that the title of Orwell’s book about his participation in the Spanish Civil War ends in the letters – ia. This brought a swiftly taken full house on places sharing their names with the tiles of novels. Right then – you hear of a gentleman with a seemingly arab sounding name, and you’re told he’s rebuilding a library. So come on it can only surely be Alexandria, can’t it? Luke Hagan thought so and this at last set the Bangor wheels in motion again. They also took one bonus on the 1997 handover of Hong Kong. An arithmetic question involving adding the numbers of stars on specific flag then dividing by the square root of the number you first thought of, or summat like that saw Matt Stafford give a very quick and correct answer. A rather gentle set on abandoned settlements in southern England provided the rampant Edinburgh team with another full house. This meant that they led by 210 – 65 at the 20 minute mark.

For the second picture starter we were shown a Leonardo – that’s the artist and not the turtle. It was quickly recognised by Matt Stafford. Three other paintings depicting John the Baptist provided two more correct answers. Such was the lead by this stage it was surely academic by now. I was pretty pleased that when the next question asked for the letter ascribed to a straight line passing through the centre of a circle I guessed it had to be D for diameter. Meringues brought another full house. You had to wait a bit wih the next starter, but when it mentioned ‘his signature tune, Take the A Train’ it become a buzzer race won by Frances Hadley. Poor old Bangor. It must have felt as if they wee on the receiving end of a beating with blunt instruments as Edinburgh took another full house on glaciers. Luke Hagan stemmed the tide for a moment, knowing that the uncle of Queen Victoria sharing a name with presidents McKinley and Taft was William. Names beginning with Cass yielded just one bonus. It was at this stage, with several minutes left on the clock, that I noticed that one more full house would be enough to take Edinburgh through the rarely-broken 300 barrier. It didn’t happen with the next starter. Katie Barnes took that with various words beginning with – rum. The Greek philosopher Theophrastus saw them take a welcome full house, pushing them through the 100 point barrier. Luke Hagan recognised Hooke’s Law (which, as we all know states you should never smile at a crocodile) and brought Bangor bonuses on Lady Mary Wortley Monatgu. I loved her series on History’s greatest fibs. Bangor took a full house, and there was just he outside possibility that they might get onto the repechage ladder. Captain Jack Cunliffe made it look less unlikely by knowing that the 40^th anniversary of The Italian Job was marked by a competition to solve the cliffhanger ending of the film. 2 bonuses put them tantalisingly close on 150. -That’s enough of that – the Edinburgh team metaphorically said and Matt Stafford buzzed in to ake the next starter on the French pointillist painter Signac. The city of Arezzo in Italy provided two correct answers, and took Edinburgh to the magical 300 points. “Written on Watter” has to refer to John Keats, surely? Frances Hadley felt so and was right. Two bonuses on Nebraska  added to the Edinburgh total. There the gong ended the contest.

Superb score, Edinburgh. Bangor did well with the bonus they were asked, achieving a 62.5 BCR, but they didn’t get asked enough. Edinburgh achieved a 72.7 BCR, all the more impressive considering just how many bonuses they were asked. We will all have to watch Edinburgh very closely from this point on.

How is Amol Doing?

Fine, what do you expect by now. It was just after the 17^th minute that Amol uncorked “Plenty of time Bangor. See if you ca get going with this.” Now, we’ve seen that so ar in this series, far from being the kiss of death that it was in the time of Paxman, this has often worked as a rallying cry, which we have quite logically taken as proof that Amol is a jedi. Well either his powers are on the wane, or Bangor are just not susceptible to the Force.

Interesting Fact That I Didn’t Already Know Of The Week

Nebraska is described as the only triply landlocked country of the USA

Baby Elephant Walk Moment

“Large lactone rings are present in which class of antibiotics? This class includes erythromycin and is commonly used to treat pneumonia and chlamydia.” No the most extreme example we’ve had this year, but pleasingly obscure.