Sunday Times 4576 (9 Feb 2014) by Tim Moorey

Solving time: 73:18 – over several sessions.

I couldn’t seem to get on the setter’s wavelength with this one, but then I often seem to find that with Tim’s puzzles. That’s not a criticism of them, more of my own limitations really. I wasn’t keen on 21d particularly. I’m not a big fan of random Christian names appearing as solutions. They’re OK as long as they’re reasonably common, but in my 43 years, I’ve never come across anyone called Irena.

cd = cryptic def., dd = double def., rev = reversal, homophones are written in quotes, anagrams as (–)*, and removals like this

Across
1 ESCADRILLE = (StREEt I’D CALL)*
7 A(C)ID
9 pRUSSIA
10 BATT(L)ING – In cricket, the side that is batting is known is ‘in’.
11 ISLA = (A-LISt)* – ‘Theatrical’ is the anagrind.
12 ON A PAR WITH = (I + gROWTH)* about NAPA – This one took me some reverse engineering.
15 CONSITUTIONAL – dd
17 QUARTER(MASTER)S
20 STAIRCASES = AIR + Continental all in STASES (pl. of stasis)
22 RICK = (I + C) in R/K (two abbreviations for king)
23 DE(TEST)ED
26 IR(A + Q)IS
27 TA-TA = A (one) + TAg all after porT – ‘Vale’ is the definition, meaning goodbye in Latin. I’m not convinced about TAG for ‘brief quote’ but it’s the best I can come up with. I like the way Tim’s used ‘latest from Port Vale’, but I’m not keen on the rest.
28 SECOND-HAND – dd
Down
2 SQUASH + COURT
3 A + B + STAINER – John Bull being a brand of beer.
4 READ + OPT
5 LOBby
6 EXTRA + Cheer Treasury
7 fALLOW
8 INN = “IN”
13 AT TIMES – dd
14 TRANSACTION = (CONSTRAINT)* about A
16 OVER + RE + A + CH
18 EXCITES = “EX-SITES”
19 SESSION = NOISES rev about S
21 IRENA = (hEARINg)* – Not the most common name in the world. Wikipedia lists 7 Irenas, all from Eastern Europe.
24 ETA = ET AL with the L (left) removed – ‘Letter from Doris’ is the definition, referring to the region of Ancient Greece.
25 DO + C – I guess the Fox reference is to Neil Fox, the DJ, known for years as Dr. Fox. Or perhaps it could be Dr Liam Fox, the Secretary of State for Defence.

13 comments on “Sunday Times 4576 (9 Feb 2014) by Tim Moorey”

  1. I was one of a few people on the Club forum who were not too happy with the names; in my case, partly because I never did parse 21d, and had never heard of ISLA (Islay, yes). But I googled ISLA afterwards and found that it’s quite a popular name in Scotland, so I’ll shut up. I could make no sense of 25d, the only __C I could come up with being Sac (the Sac and Fox nation of American Indians), which didn’t look too likely. Finally got DOC from the checkers and definition. If either of Dave’s solutions is correct, I can’t say much for the clue. But I did like ETA. 20ac was nice, too, but flight=stairs is a tad overused.
  2. 37 minutes.

    Never heard of ESCADRILLE. Didn’t understand ‘Fox’ at 25 and I agree with Kevin if either explanation given above is correct.

    I had considered the same as Dave’s explanation of TA-TA but dismissed it, and my deliberations weren’t helped by the thought that the solution might well have been TA-RA which also means ‘goodbye’. But having investigated further I found ‘tag’ defined as ‘a brief and usually familiar quotation’ so the clue is sound after all.

    I’d have thought IRENA was a more straightforward name than ISLA, the latter only having come to my attention for the first time when one of them co-hosted ‘The Generation Game’.

    Edited at 2014-02-16 10:24 am (UTC)

  3. Not a particularly happy experience this. I was mystified by DOC and TATA. I think your explanation for the latter is right, but I’m still puzzled by the former. However I haven’t been able to identify an alternative Dr Fox either so maybe it really is one of those. I realise that people don’t have to be dead to appear in these puzzles but it would help if they were at least famous.
    I didn’t have a clue about either of the names: I just bunged in the only ones I could come up with that fitted the checkers. IRENA turned out to be right. ESTA turned out to be wrong.
  4. I endorse all the comments: I dislike any old names as answers there are simply too many – I stopped doing the Sunday Express skeleton for that reason. I had “Usha” for 11a (don’t ask me why apart from it fitted as a name) and “ta-ra” (as in the Northern farewell) for 27a (and I still don’t understand the clue). With 25d I took it to mean Dave’s latter definition, which would be very obscure for people outside the UK.
    Rather like wading through treacle: took me a long time to get nowhere in particular.
  5. This was a DNF for me, courtesy of the second of the names. I also agree that unless we are all missing something, the clueing for DOC is poor. I wrote it in as it had to be , as opposed to knowing what Fox had to do with anything.
  6. Found this a little harder than most of Mr Moorey’s recent offerings, with most time spent on trying to justify TA-TA vs ta-ra.

    I don’t have any particular issues with names as answers, especially when the wordplay is clear, and ISLA doesn’t strike me as that obscure, especially for Brits – the viewing figures for the Generation Game were often well over a third of the population of the UK when (as jackkt mentions) Isla St Clair was the hostess. IRENA is much less common in my experience – the only one I can recall encountering was a supervisor at university.

    Tag came up in the Mephisto or Listener recently – it’s perhaps the same tag as in the tag line of a movie, e.g. “In space, no one can hear you scream”.

    When I solved DOC at the time, the DJ was the first person that came to mind (though I solved it from the wordplay), which seemed rather obscure, but looking at the clue again I would assume that the surface indicates it’s Liam Fox.

  7. 21:49 .. enjoyed at the time, perhaps because I saw the wordplay for IRENA and ISLA quickly.

    Looking at it now, I share the slight bafflement over TA-TA and DOC, and can’t shake the feeling that we’re missing something on both. I gave it 5 minutes on Google, but only came up with the totally irrelevant but lovely quote (tag?) from Nelson Algren:

    “Never play cards with a man called Doc. Never eat at a place called Mom’s. Never sleep with a woman whose troubles are worse than your own.”

  8. I didn’t like this crossword at all. Several desperately poor clues, especially 27ac, 21dn… just not my cup of tea, I guess
  9. It was ETA that got me. I guess it’s because of my lack of a classical education but I still think it’s too much on the obscure side of things. I also couldn’t parse TA-TA or DOC but put them in as best guess. Port Vale helped. As for Irena, I knew a Polish lady by that name for many years but it was still a bit of a guess.
  10. I didn’t mind the women’s names too much because I thought the wordplay was pretty clear, and in the case of IRENA, rather nifty. It took me a long time to twig that “spending limits” device, but once you get that, the only other possibility would be INERA, which looks a lot less likely. I don’t doubt there’s someone out there with that name, and if you count fantasy role playing games, there’s probably thousands, so I guess technically it might not be wrong. Irena’s in the 2003 Chambers list of “some first names”.
    Probably like most people who arrived at 11 without checkers, LISA was my first guess, but I’m sad enough and old enough to remember Isla St Clair (…O mist rolling in from the sea…), but then even she was born Isabella Margaret Dice. There aren’t many Islas on Wiki either.
    It’s that DOC Fox that really got me. Again, the wordplay’s easy, but Doctor Fox the DJ isn’t that bright a star in the firmament (sorry Neil, but you are now broadcasting on Magic FM, so you’ve only yourself to blame). Neither he nor Liam MP are ever referred to as Doc Fox: if you really want obscure, check out the people that do use the soubriquet. I put it in with a shrug thinking of the DJ.
    Some comments on the Club site on RACK as a perfectly valid alternative to 21, though Peter (bless him) stepped in to offer a calming voice. But it did introduce a TLS type lottery to the proceedings.
  11. IRENA went in from wordplay, and verified by Chambers 2003.
    ISLA was Isla St Clair
    DOC Fox, again from wordplay – assumed to be someone hugely famous in the world of pop, who I’d never heard of because it’s of no interest whatever to me – and didn’t bother to look up, as solution required was clear.
  12. Tim’s musical tastes seem to be classical rather than pop, and Dr Liam Fox was indeed the idea behind 35. “Brief quotation” seemed right for TAG as in “Latin tag”, and is supported by Collins. Slightly puzzled by the agony about the names – it seems that you all knew what kind of answer was required, and they can’t be the only kind of answer where a wrong answer can fit the def but not the wordplay. As it happens, a name definition at 25A would have avoided the accidental alternative answer.
  13. I notice that in the Azed clue-setting competition a few months ago Tim Moorey got a VHC for his clue to LOB: ‘Term for ball over Boris’s head’, which bears no relation to his clue for 5dn [Loft accessed by leaving vestibule], but in that competition W.F.Main got a VHC for ‘Loft is found by leaving entrance hall’.

    Wil Ransome (it won’t let me log in because I’ve changed my computer and my old one remembered my password, which is more than I can do).

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