25th February–Away to the Weavers

 

Again I am indebted to Bob for supplying details as I was again out of town - Nick

Tuesday we played at the newly refurbished Weavers in the newly foreshortened Thornton Square, no longer a vast, pitch-black, ankle-breaker car park, but a bright parking lot with some new-build adjacent. The pub itself has been changed just sufficiently to make it more homely, which was just what it needed. A bright, cosy atmosphere and a good selection of ales.  Perhaps this lulled the WGL into a false sense of security as it went steadily downhill from there...  The questions were OK - not an armadillo in sight, and the

Chester Road Tavern provided two great 'free' specialist rounds - "A colourful life" and "Trigger Points" - a good little tribute round to the great Roger Lloyd-Pack.

In Nick's absence, WGL were joined by Dave Jones who scored a creditable 18 points for us. The home team were welcoming, as were the butties, and Caroline, the QM hosted the quiz really well. But all this didn't stop the Lemmings going further and further behind until we were somewhat bemused that an enjoyable quiz had drifted into a thumping win by the Weavers of 196 points to 115.   A good quiz, we thought, but for us on the night a bad toss to lose.

We have decided not to mention that it was the opposition wot got the question "What great American Folk Singer died recently?" Yes, we know it was Pete Seeger, but what group did he play in for many years..... The Weavers!

18th Feb Away to the Knot ‘Arf

 

It is always a pleasure to head for Rushton Spencer to play either of their two teams and this was no exception. Much fun was had from the repetition in previous games of Trowbridge being the county town of Wiltshire (see comments from 28th January) that fuelled more humour with the evening’s questions – hedgehogs were flavour of the evening but the questions were fine, especially the Specialist although the Knot’s avid interest in cricket served them well.

At the end of the Specialist the Lemmings were trailing by just 5 points with 68 to 73 – not usually a problem as the General Knowledge is pretty good for the Lemmings and they were slowly making up the deficit until two disastrous rounds where they scored practically nothing at all and fell impossibly behind losing the General Knowledge with 60 to 110. Final score a great win for the ‘Arfs with 183 to 128.

Individual scores were Bob 18/12, Wendy 18/9, Nick 6/9, Tomo 18/6, conferred points 7/16, with pass-overs 1/8; the home team picked up pass-overs 4/13

A most enjoyable evening rounded off with generously filled sandwiches with chips – many thanks to the Knot, the ‘Arfs and the Dragons for interesting questions

11th Feb Away to The Ox-Fford

 

Nick was again out of town and his place was taken by Tony – Bob has been kind enough to send in the following report:

“ We played the Ox-fford, including Mark and got off to a very slow start - after round two it looked like we were in for a thrashing almost equal to Arsenal at Liverpool, but the ship steadied and we were only four points behind at the end of the specialists! Although Wendy's figures showed that at one stage we got within a point of them, we couldn't keep it up and they ran out winners by 146 to 123.  Another demonstration of us knowing a lot of the questions that they knew but it was like an Arab celebration - no Passovers! There was a "who am I" round which everybody seemed to enjoy, and I found my questions not too bad, but Tommo and Tony in particular, were not having much luck with their questions. The company was great, though we did have one complaint. They were selling Marstons' bitter for £2 a pint which we thought was a deliberate ploy on the part of the Ox-Fford team to lull us into a false sense of security. There was a large slice of humour to the match and we couldn't help but dwell for a moment on the fact that as soon as the floods hit the Thames Valley, including Windsor, Marlow, Eaton and other bastions of Tory heartland, the first thing the Prime Minister shouts is "Money's No Object". I wonder if he'd have said that if it was Sunderland? The whole quiz was excellently and entertainingly refereed by the Knot Know-All's, and rounded off with good butties! Thanks to the Ox-fford for hosting such a good evening.

Match stats:

Final score: Ox-fford 146.

Waters Green Lemmings 123.

Specialists: Ox-fford 57; WGL 53

GK:              ox-fford 89; WGL 70

Conferred: Ox-fford 33; WGL 17

Passed Over: Ox-fford 23.  WGL 7

Bob: 33

Wendy: 33

Tony: 12

Tommo: 21”

The questions have been unavoidably detained (stolen laptop) but are now available in a rather different format.

Thanks all

4th February–Away to The Dolphin

 

Revenge is mine; I will repay saith the Dolphin (with apologies to the King James version Romans 12:19)

In the first game after the Christmas break, Alan the question-master from the Dolphin had sworn to “leather” the Lemmings who had won the first round against the Dolphin, so it was with some trepidation that they headed up the hill to the pub safe only in the knowledge that the Robinson’s beer is one of the best (if not THE best)  in town.

On a serious note our opponents like a laugh and are good fun to play and this was no exception. It was a very pleasant game and the few quibbles about the questions or answers were resolved with good nature and laughter under the watchful eyes of the question masters from the British Flag.

It was one of those nights when the questions fell easily for some and were a real headache for others although as usual conferred questions served the Lemmings well. Some in particular stretched the rules a bit, in particular round 4 of the Specialist that were arithmetical (admittedly easy) but required two other answers as well (a glance at the round will make this clear). Nick suffered his usual problems with names (Van Eyck for Vermeer) and the whole team played an over-cautious game conferring questions only to confirm the original knee-jerk answer.

At the end of the Specialist the Lemmings were 10 points behind with 46 to 56 but hopes were undimmed as they have often picked up that many points in the General Knowledge – but it was not to be – the General Knowledge finished with equal scores of 82 and a final score of 128 to the Lemmings and 138 to the Dolphin.

Individual scores were Bob 18/18, Wendy 0/18, Nick 6/6 and Tomo 9/24; conferred points were 9/11 with 4/5 pass-overs whilst the Dolphin collected 8/10 pass-overs.

The evening ended with a supper of an outstanding cheese and potato pie with an excellent shortcrust pastry, a superb meat and potato pie and if that was not enough there were chips!! Thank you The Dolphin and the team for a very pleasant evening.

To sum up, revenge is a dish best served cold, but that supper steeled the Lemmings to face the dreadful rain and cold outside.