News & Views: 2023–4 Season – Plate Final – 15 October 2024

The Plate Final and AGM were held at the Pack Horse Bowling Club.

The Nags Head won the toss, and elected (unusually) to go second.

The Hammers played under the name by which they will be known in the 2024–5 season.

Both teams scored well in the first round, at the end of which the Hammers led by 19 points to 16. Round 2 proved more testing, with three questions not being answered by either team  - two odd and one even - and the Nags pulled one point back to trail by just two. In Round 3 the Hammers pulled further ahead, winning it by 20 points to 17 - but at the break both teams had everything to play for, the Hammers leading by just five points.

That all changed in the first half of Round 4, when the Nags failed to answer any of their first four questions correctly and the Hammers picked up four pass-overs. The Nags scored two points on Question 70, so at the mid-way point of Round 4 the Hammers had increased their lead to 15.

By the end of the round they were a further two ponts ahead, and a fruitless streak towards the end of Round 5 meant that the Nags found themselves 25 points behind. That left them with a lot of work to do in the final round, and eight questions in they were having a good go at it - scoring seven points to the Hammers' one. But in the final twelve questions the scores were dead level, so the Hammers came out worthy winners by 107 points to 88.

In total, ten questions were not answered by either team. There was a slight imbalance in this respect, with seven of them being odd-numbered and only three even. But with 87 questions (72.5%) being answered for two points and 21 (17.5%) on pass-over, the level would seem to have been pretty much just right.

The questions were assembled by the Nags Head 'B'. Mark Watson was as entertaining as ever in the role of Question Master (we almost got to half time without a mention of you-know-what) and was ably assisted by Steve Carter and Paul Morrissey on scoring duties.

© Macclesfield Quiz League 2024