University Challenge 2027 First Round Emmanuel, Cambridge v. Somerville, Oxford

The Teams

Emmanuel, Cambridge

Olga Devine

Sam Palmer

Fin Brickman (capt.)

Adrija Bhattacharya

Somerville, Oxford

Milton Lee

Zoe McGuire

Rohan George (capt.)

Elijah Scheinson

For the first starter I thought it had to be Tito (that’s General Tito of former Yugoslavia not Tito from the Jackson Five). Sam Palmer buzzed in early with the same answer. Bonuses on fine Art and the TV show Succession brought one correct answer. Adrija Bhattacharya, who was going to have a very productive evening, recognised clues to the Catalan language. I’d guess that there was at least one Great British Bake Off fan on the Emmanuel team because they took a full house on baking terms in fairly short order. I’m sure that I have seen the swan automaton that was the subject of the next starter but Somerville lost five and Emmanuel didn’t know it. The next starter took a while to become clear but the phrase ‘polyalphabetic substitution’ suggested cryptography and Adrija Bhattacharya won the buzzer race to give that answer. Organometallic chemist Sir Geoffrey Wilkinson is not, I will admit, a household name in LAM Towers but despite the soporific effect of the bonuses about him I answered one, earning myself a lap of honour while Emmanuel didn’t get any of them. So to the picture round and a line drawing of an oak tree and an oak leaf. Now, I hope that we’re all mature enough that I can mention that they came from Baden-Powell’s “Scouting for Boys” without any sniggering in the back of the room. Fin Brickman sounded as if he was guessing, but he was right. More of the same brought nowt. A work on medicine allowed Milton Lee to raise the Somerville total to zero, having had two incorrect interruptions earlier. The linguistic landscape of the middle East at around the time of the birth of Jesus brought a full house. This meant that at the 10 minute mark Emmanuel led by 55 – 15.

For the next starter Fin Brickman knew that Lloyd George became PM on the resignation of Robin Asquith. (ask your Grandad). Secondary characters in The Witcher series of books brought two bonuses. Look we weren’t given enough of the next starter for me to have a clue about it but Adrija Bhattacharya gave the correct answer of Transformer. The third Muromachi shogun did not promise me a great deal – yet I managed two correct answers as did Emmanuel, who missed a full house by zigging with Kabuki while they should have zagged with Noh. For the music starter nobody recognised one of Mussorgsky’s chart toppers, Night on Bald Mountain. Elijah Scheinson knew the latin term Colonia after Emmanuel had lost five. Music bonuses on more pieces inspired by mountain climbing brought them one bonus. A bit of a convoluted twisty question eventually allowed Elijah Scheinson to take his double with California. Heinrich Kayser (what a geezer) brought one bonus. Rohan George continued the Somerville purple patch knowing about the muon. UNESCO World Heritage Sites in France brought another single correct answer. Both teams’ members are probably too young for the portmanteau word Madchester to mean much to them and neither team got it for the next starter. That man Scheinson obliged with the next starter, knowing what a theme was in the Byzantine empire. The bonuses were uses of the word villain in Shakespeare, (‘Alas, poor Yorick, I knew him Horatio, a fellow of infinite jest, and in his cups, a right villain, innit?’) They took one but would have done better to just guess at the biggies rather than looking for something more obscure for the 2^nd and 3^rd. Still, as we rounded down on the 20 minute mark Somerville had made significant inroads into the Emmanuel lead, as the score stood at 90 – 75.

For the second picture starter Adrija Bhattacharya recognised a still of Michael B. Jordan in Sinners. Three more stills from films in which actors played their own twins brought nothing. Sir Clive Lloyd – whom I saw in what I think was his last test match in England at the Oval in 1984 – I knew was from Guyana. Nobody else did. Milton Lee knew that the first non round moon to be discovered was Hyperion. A full house on countries of the Middle East narrowed the lead to just 5 points. So Olga Devine picked just the right time to get her first starter, giving Norway as The Country That Became Too Rich. The discovery of Australopithecus brought two bonuses. Adrija Bhattacharya took another starter knowing that Korsakoff’s syndrome can lead to amnesia. (supply your own jokes). Terms used in climbing and bouldering brought two bonuses. Sam Palmer won the buzzer race to identify the northernmost point of Canada as being situated on Ellesmere Island. Poems on Death brought another two bonuses and the gap was looking unbridgeable in the few minutes we had left. It didn’t help too much when Fin Brickman buzzed too early for the next starter, which allowed Rohan George to answer fluorine. Music in the early 20^th century saw a bit of confusion throw away one of the bonuses and take one of the others. Poor old Rohan George jumped too early at the Brothers Grimm to give us fairy tales, but the question concerned their other hat, as lexicographers. Olga Devine knocked that one into the open goal. Terms in biology beginning with sph brought a couple of bonuses, and the outcome of the contest was certain by now. Words beginning with Dh allowed Fin Brickman to apply a little more gilding to the Emmanuel score. Former counties of England brought one bonus before the gong brought the contest to an end. The last few minutes had been dominated by Emmanuel and they won by 190 to 105, but make no mistake, they were made to fight for it

For the record, Emmanuel’s BCR was 47.2% to Somerville’s 52.3%. Not a lot in that, but Emmanuel won it with their buzzing and found an extra gear when they needed to.

Amol Watch

I’ll be honest, I think that saying “At one point I thought that you guys might get zero” to Somerville was not the most consoling thing he could have said at the end.

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

Lincoln is ultimately derived from the Latin word Colonia, meaning a city or outpost in recently conquered territory.

Baby Elephant Walk Moment

Wilkinson shared the Nobel Prize with which German chemist (das Boots?) who also discovered the structures of organometallic sandwich compounds? This chemist and Richard Schrock give their names to two different varieties of transition metal carbene complexes. - Would one of them be dum de dumdum dum dum dum dum dumdum?