News and Views: 2017–18 Season – Week 7 – 5 December 2017

Results

As discussed in more detail below, scoring this week was very average (this is a fact, not a euphemism!) and there were several close games. The closest game of all was in the A League, where the Dolphin beat the Weaver by just two points. This was only the Dolphin's second win of the season (but they have also drawn one game).

All games in the B League were fairly close, the biggest margin of victory being the twelve points by which the Nags Head beat the Royal Oak.

In the C League there were two fairly close games, and a convincing victory for the Cock Inn over the Chester Road Tavern.

Tables

In the A League, the Ox–fford 'C' moved back to the top of the table by winning the game in hand that they had over their stablemates the Ox–fford. The Dolphin moved up two places by virtue of their victory over the Weaver (and the Wharfies being on question setting and asking duty).

With more than one third of the season now played, there is just one point separating the third- and seventh-placed teams in the A League. The Church House Bollington and the Dolphin are third and fourth by virtue of their drawn game in Week 5; the Weaver, the Dolphin Dragons and the Wharfies are all one point behind them. Similarly in the B League, third and sixth are separated by just one point: the Harrington Academicals and the Plough Horntails, who also drew in Week 5, trail the Royal Oak and the Waters Green Lemmings.

There was no change in the B League this week; the top two teams won, but the Plough Horntails opened up a gap between themselves and the Robin Hood with a win over the under–strength Lemmings.

In the C League, the Sutton Mutton moved into second place (behind their stablemates the Sutton Club) by winning their game in hand over the Park Taverners.

Individual

Congratulations to Bob Thompson of the Waters Green Rams, whose 51 was the highest score of the week. There were thirteen personal bests – a respectable number for this stage of the season.

In the A League, Haydn Thompson moved to the top of the table for the first time in a very long while (if not ever!). Graham Bailey moved up from fifth place into second, but has played a game more than anyone else in the Top 10.

Dave Partington, who was on question asking duty, was overtaken by no fewer than four people in the B League – dropping from second to sixth. Dave now has a game in hand on all five of the people above him.

In the C League, Jackie Hulme took advantage of Shauna Barstow being on question asking duty to move into the top spot.

A League

Results

Church House Bollington	121	178	Ox–fford 'C'
Ed Baron	36	48	Haydn Thompson
Dolphin Dragons	165	146	British Flag
Robin Morrell (pb) Liz Horrocks (pb)	48 45	36 30 30	Neil Drummond (pb) Ian Tams Tony Browne (pb)
Weaver	140	142	Dolphin
Graham Bailey	42	42	Alan Hodgson

Table

	Played	Won	Drawn	Lost	Total	Points
Ox–fford 'C'	5	5	0	0	879	10
Ox–fford	5	4	0	1	825	8
Church House Bollington	6	2	1	3	909	5
Dolphin	5	2	1	2	759	5
Weaver	6	2	0	4	924	4
Dolphin Dragons	5	2	0	3	765	4
Wharfies	5	2	0	3	744	4
British Flag	5	1	0	4	729	2

Individual Top Ten

	Team	Played	Total	Highest	Lowest	Week 7
Haydn Thompson	Ox–fford 'C'	5	237	54	42	48
Graham Bailey	Weaver	6	225	45	30	42
Alice Walker	Ox–fford 'C'	5	222	48	36	45
Brian Bogie	Wharfies	5	210	51	30
Peter McBride	Dolphin	5	207	51	33	36
Ashton Davies	Church House Bollington	5	207	51	30
Alan Hodgson	Dolphin	5	204	45	36	42
Liz Horrocks	Dolphin Dragons	5	195	45	27	45
Mark Watson	Ox–fford	4	183	48	45
Alan Gilday	Weaver	5	183	42	27	27

B League

Results

Waters Green Rams	148	142	Robin Hood
Bob Thompson (pb)	51	36	Phil Moss (pb)
Nags Head	146	134	Royal Oak
Andy Johnson (pb)	36	27 27	Rosalie James Alan James
Plough Horntails	139	129	Waters Green Lemmings
Anne Jeater (pb)	39	33 27 21	Jon Thompson Bob Langstaff Becky Turner (pb)

Table

	Played	Won	Drawn	Lost	Total	Points
Nags Head	6	5	0	1	896	10
Waters Green Rams	5	5	0	0	798	10
Royal Oak	6	3	0	3	919	6
Waters Green Lemmings	6	3	0	3	799	6
Harrington Academicals	5	2	1	2	691	5
Plough Horntails	5	2	1	2	640	5
Robin Hood	6	1	0	5	832	2
Harrington 'B'	5	0	0	5	594	0

Individual Top Ten

	Team	Played	Total	Highest	Lowest	Week 7
Alasdair Reid	Nags Head	6	219	54	24	30
Alan James	Royal Oak	6	198	39	27	27
Jon Thompson	Waters Green Lemmings	6	192	42	24	33
Jim Kennelly	Robin Hood	6	189	4	21	27
Andrew Wright	Nags Head	6	189	36	27	27
Dave Partington	Harrington Academicals	5	186	48	30
Keith Pointon	Waters Green Rams	5	186	45	27	39
Rosalie James	Royal Oak	6	177	45	21	27
Andy Johnson	Nags Head	6	159	36	18	36
Bob Langstaff	Waters Green Lemmings	5	153	42	24	27
Malcolm Asquith	Plough Horntails	5	153	39	24	54

C League

Results

Sutton Club	131	122	Park Timers
Paul Heaven Simon Rumsey (pb) Emma Griggs (pb)	30 27 24	36	John Poyser (pb)
Prince of Wales	103	108	Sutton Mutton
Tim Hayes Kenny Davenport-Slater	18 18	21	Wynne Keith-Davies
Cock Inn	137	99	Chester Road Tavern
Peter Wilcox (pb)	33	21	Mitch Moores

Table

	Played	Won	Drawn	Lost	Total	Points
Sutton Club	6	4	1	1	734	9
Sutton Mutton	5	4	0	1	624	8
Park Taverners	5	3	0	2	641	6
Park Timers	5	3	0	2	630	6
Cock Inn	6	2	1	3	725	5
Prince of Wales	6	2	0	4	677	4
Pack Horse Bowling Club	5	2	0	3	592	4
Chester Road Tavern	6	1	0	5	679	2

Individual Top Ten

	Team	Played	Total	Highest	Lowest	Week 7
Jackie Hulme	Cock Inn	6	159	33	21	27
Shauna Barstow	Park Taverners	5	147	51	15
Wynne Keith-Davies	Sutton Mutton	5	144	39	21	21
Andy Ridgway	Prince of Wales	6	144	39	12	15
John Poyser	Park Timers	5	141	36	18	36
Peter Wilcox	Cock Inn	5	141	33	21	33
Glyn Bradley	Park Timers	5	126	36	15	30
Petyer Bullivent	Cock Inn	6	120	30	12	24
Graham Wallace	Park Taverners	4	114	30	27
Tony Moores	Chester Road Tavern	5	114	30	15	15

Cars & Vans 4U Question Setters' Trophy

	Wk			Difficulty	Balance	Ent'ment	Total	Last Year
1	3	Spec	British Flag	8.51	8.88	7.11	24.50	24.69
2	6	GK	Sutton Club	8.66	9.64	5.79	24.09	19.98
3	1	Spec	Ox–fford	10.00	6.78	7.22	24.00	22.17
4	4	GK	Waters Green Rams	5.91	7.57	6.22	19.70	18.84
5	2	GK	Royal Oak	5.14	8.31	5.72	19.17	8.20
6	5	GK	Ox–fford 'C'	5.50	8.14	5.37	19.01	17.41
7	1	Spec	Ox–fford	8.15	4.33	6.50	18.98	17.22
8	7	Spec	Wharfies	5.66	7.47	5.44	18.57	14.58
9	3	GK	British Flag	3.62	7.70	5.67	16.99
10	2	Spec	Sutton Mutton	5.09	8.38	3.44	16.91	(11.50)
11	4	Spec	Pack Horse Bowling Club	3.92	8.15	4.40	16.47	(13.95)
12	7	GK	Wharfies	4.97	7.37	3.33	15.68	22.03
13	6	Spec	Sutton Club	5.73	4.54	5.44	15.50
14	5	Spec	Ox–fford 'C'	5.01	3.19	5.79	13.98	19.47

For the full spreadsheet, please click here.

The Wharfies' questions were well balanced. In each half there was a slight bias in favour of the teams that went second (104% to 98% in the Specialist, and 102% to 96% in the General Knowledge). Overall there was a minuscule bias in favour of the teams that went "first first". This is borne out by the fact that five of these teams won and four of them lost.

The Specialist questions were slightly easier than average, and the GK slightly harder; overall they were as close to exactly average as makes no difference – on average, teams scored 99.5% of their average scores.

The Entertainment marks however are a different matter. The Specialist questions received a more or less average score, but the General Knowledge were not popular – particularly in the C League, where they scored 1.83 out of 10. One contestant described them as possibly the worst set of questions he had seen in 17 years, and (he added) no wonder we are losing teams. Strong stuff ...

It's true that there were a few obvious errors in the questions: Pirates of Penzance for HMS Pinafore, and in two cases a pair of questions that clearly should have gone to opposite sides went not just to the same side but to the same person. (The result, no doubt, of questions being moved at the last minute; this is not the first time that's happened.) Some people felt that it was unreasonable to ask for the population of Sweden (or, presumably, the Netherlands), even with what might be described as generous leeway (approximately 9% one way, and over 10% the other). An anonymous contributor to Nick's blog nominated this as an Armadillo question (i.e. a candidate for the worst, or most obscure, question of the season). Some people also identified one or more questions that had already been asked recently.

But ... the worst questions ever?

In his blog, Nick Peck – normally very slow to criticise – wrote of "far too many on TV and film and also an imbalance on sport." I counted eleven questions on TV and four on film, with one more (the Brideshead Revisited question) that could be construed as both film and TV but was actually about a stately home. I agree that eleven is probably too many for TV, but overall I counted 32 on Arts & Entertainment. When I set questions I reckon to allocate three questions per person in this wide and varied category; this was four.

As for sport: I counted seven questions – three to the team going first (in the GK) and four to the one going second. Of these, two were the two "players in a team" questions, both of which went to the same player (in team two) – clearly, as discussed above, the result of a simple error that many of us have been guilty of in the past. Other than this I can see no imbalance.

I personally felt that apart from the obvious errors mentioned a few paragraphs ago, the questions were basically quite good. Our team marked them down for these errors, but if I remember correctly we scored them 6 or 7 out of 10.

If the C League teams were marking them 1 or 2 out of 10 (which they were), maybe this goes to prove what I've often said before: that it only takes a few howlers to get people's backs up.

If you are a member of one of the teams that marked these questions particularly lowly, I would be interested to hear your views. Please email haydn@maccql.com, and I will post your comments in a future News & Views.

© Macclesfield Quiz League 2018