Alright, let me address the elephant in the room. What on Earth is going on with the specialist rounds this season? Now yes, we all know that the questions in both rounds tend to be much longer than they were ten years ago, but I don’t know, in the last few shows it has seemed worse than ever. You see since the show returned after the early season break for the cricket, we’ve had just one double figure specialist round, and that was a 10. I just think it’s a little disheartening for people who obviously know their subject to end up with 7s and 8s, which in previous years would have been looked on as pretty unimpressive scores.
Well, the first of last night’s contenders was Dan
Shoesmith who was answering on the Star Wars sequel trilogy. My son took me to
watch The Force Awakens, which I enjoyed, but the last two films which I caught
on telly not so much and I took the first but didn’t trouble the scorer again. Dan
took 7 points. In previous years this would have meant he would have been out
of it by half time. But then in previous years that performance would, I feel,
have earned more points.
Emma Cresswell virtually scuppered her own chances as soon
as she revealed that she is a teacher. This meant that she received the curse
of support from the Clark sofa. Emma was answering on Henry Moore. He is an
artist whom I can respect, but I cannot say I have a deep and heartfelt
attachment to his work. Which is a long winded way of saying I didn’t add to my
aggregate on this round. Emma scored five.
James Sowden offered us the band Elbow. This proved to be another
fruitless round for me. James started pretty well, and I never felt that he
wasn’t coping with it. However he had only scored 6 by the end of it.
Finally student Morgan Bush with a round on King Edward VI,
my banker round for the night. Yes, the traditional history subjects like this
have been a steady source of points for me over the years, and I was pretty
happy to add four easy ones to my total to give me an aggregate of five. Morgan
himself scored five. I did think he missed at least a couple he might have had,
but that’s the way it goes sometimes.
Emma returned to the chair. It’s often hard to say
something which isn’t mean about GK rounds where the contender doesn’t do as
well as they would have liked. Emma gave it a lash, as we say, but the
questions just did not seem to fall her way and she finished with a total of
12.
Right. Morgan Bush’s GK round put me in mind of something I
used to say. When my late grandmother used to predict that one day I would win
Mastermind – yes, honestly she did – I used to reply that I wasn’t going to go
on it until I was in my forties when I’d still be quick to answer, but would
know a lot more. This annoyingly precocious attitude is only slightly
ameliorated by the fact that I was in my early forties when I did go on it and
I won. Still, Morgan’s GK round demonstrated a very good reason to try the show
at his age. Because his GK round was very good! Having said that, if he’s that
good now, if he keeps quizzing he’ll be great in a decade or two. An absolutely
terrific 13 gave him 18 and a shot at a win.
Mind you, James Sowden wasn’t too far behind after his
round. In fact, his 12 put him as close as you can be without actually tying.
He scored 12 to take his total to 18 and one pass. However Morgan Bush’s old
head on young shoulders had seen that he hadn’t passed at all. Just Dan to go,
then.
Dan did not answer very quickly. However, that slight pause
before a lot of the answers ensured that he gave a correct one rather than blurting
out a wrong one. Don’t knock it. A significant number of Mastermind GK
questions that you don’t immediately KNOW the answer to will yield results after
a moment’s thought. Dan was across the line with a couple of questions to spare
and he too scored 13 for 20. Well played, sir. Best of luck for the semi
finals.
The Details
|
Dan Shoesmith |
The Star Wars Sequel
Trilogy |
7 |
2 |
13 |
1 |
20 |
3 |
|
Emma Cresswell |
Henry Moore |
5 |
0 |
7 |
1 |
12 |
1 |
|
James Sowden |
Elbow |
6 |
1 |
12 |
0 |
18 |
1 |
|
Morgan Bush |
Edward VI |
5 |
0 |
13 |
0 |
18 |
0 |
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