Sunday Times 4702 by David McLean – special one

Author   keriothePosted on Categories Weekend Cryptic
37:15, with one error. This was rather a controversial crossword, generating an awful lot of comment on the club site, much of it negative. The football theme was not welcomed by a lot of people, and more generally thematic puzzles as a genre came in for a bit of stick. The puzzle did have its fans though, and we were treated to an impassioned defence of his fellow setter by Dean Mayer.

I think some of the criticism aimed at this puzzle was harsh: as a matter of principle I have nothing against something a bit different from time to time, and I certainly found much of this a worthwhile challenge. However I have to admit that overall I am in the ‘didn’t enjoy it a huge amount’ camp. The problem with a themed puzzle like this is that it is very difficult to create 30-odd clues which all reflect the theme without compromising on quality: sometimes the theme just doesn’t want to be shoe-horned in. For me there were a few clues in that category, and this created a slight feeling that the self-imposed constraint of the theme was getting in the way.

I think a bit of perspective is in order though. I’m sure I’d have more than forgiven these little foibles if I had been a football fan, and it’s hardly the setter’s fault that I’m not. And given the occasion a puzzle aimed at those who are is just the ticket. As a feat of setting prowess this puzzle is incredibly impressive, so why not just get over yourself and admire it for what it is?

On top of the theme in the clues, Harry managed to get an (as it turns out very inaccurate) prediction into the grid: the left and right-hand columns read GERMANS WIN ON PENS. I never spot ninas anyway, but having the wrong answer at 19ac would have prevented me on this occasion even if I had looked, which I didn’t. So thanks to whoever pointed this out on the forum.

Here’s how I think it all works. Thanks to Harry for a really impressive challenge, and please don’t be put off by the moaners, myself included.

Across
1 Polished Germany gutted about defeat
GLOSSY – LOSS (defeat) contained in GermanY. TFW 1ac goes straight in and you think ‘this is going to be easy’.
5 Evil manager leaving foremost of strikers out
SVENGALI – (LEAVING, Strikers)*.
9 Fix to lose head with northern side in quarters?
ENCAMPMENT – cEMENT (fix to lose head) containing N, CAMP (side). This is a wee bit clunky, with a strange surface.
10 Nordic news on half-cut hooligan gang
FINN – FIrm, NN (news). One of the Collins definitions of ‘firm’ is ‘a gang of football hooligans’. I vaguely remembered this, and was more bothered by the use of ‘Nordic’ as a noun, but it’s given in ODO (albeit as a plural usage) and Chambers.
11 Short official’s empty head the object of some discussion
REFERENT – REFEREe, NuT. Another slightly unwieldy surface.
12 Still thrashed 7-0!
EVEN SO – (SEVEN, O)*. A sort of indirect anagram.
13 Female graduate taking Old Trafford side to heart
MONA – M(ON)A. A neat trick here, playing on the fact that Old Trafford is the name of a cricket ground as well as the home of Manchester United. So ‘Old Trafford side’ is ON (aka LEG).
15 Live broadcast of a nicer style of football
AMERICAN – AM (live, as in ‘I live’), (A NICER)*.
18 A home side working on sticking together
ADHESION – (A, H, SIDE)*, ON. H is an abbreviation for ‘home’ in football matches, appropriately.
19 Central midfielders sent off in costly action
STEP – STEeP. Or STeEP, if you prefer, with the removed E being the central letter in ‘midfielders’. Not SUEZ, which I had as a ‘costly action’ that you can somehow construct by removing the central letters from Luis SUarEZ. The wordplay doesn’t remotely work, and Suarez is a striker, but this was my last in and I was feeling a bit worn down by that point so just bunged it in.
21 Series of internationals for Turkey?
NATION – contained in ‘internationals’. I thought this was pretty weak, since the answer is the root of the wordplay element, which makes it very obvious. So obvious in fact that I couldn’t quite believe it was the answer, so a kind of double bluff!
23 Countering force spot opening against Spain
ANTIDOTE – ANTI (against), E (Spain) with DOT (spot) ‘opening’ (i.e. separating) them.
25 Bung: loads of money kicked back
STOP – reversal of POTS.
26 Daily that features current head of club
CHAIRWOMAN – CHA(I)RWOMAN.
27 They press on-edge players to contain runs
WRINGERS – W(R)INGERS. Is wringing the same thing as pressing? Close enough I guess.
28 Bit of a lather over restricting match levies
DUTIES – reversal of SUD (bit of a lather) containing TIE (match).

Down
2 With nothing to lose, lie about dive
LUNGE – LoUNGE.
3 Draw with hard team using a new formation
STALEMATE – STALE (hard), (TEAM)*.
4 Agent wages upset garrulous commentator?
YAPPER – reversal of REP (agent), PAY.
5 SFA wanted a messy fan dressed differently
SWEET FANNY ADAMS – (WANTED A MESSY FAN)*. Corker of an anagram!
6 Northern fixtures English journalist admired
ESTEEMED – reversal (northern) of MEETS, then E (English), all contained in ED (journalist). I’m not very keen on ‘northern’ as a reversal indicator here. To my mind it suggests location, and we need something that suggests direction.
7 Manager prevented from reaching final by this?
GAFFE – GAFFEr. Semi-&Lit. Whatever your views of football you have to admit that’s a pretty neat clue.
8 Left with free space to improve grounds
LANDSCAPE – L, AND, (SPACE)*.
14 Pole with energy in former side of Rui Costa?
OLD MASTER – OLD (former), Rui containing MAST (pole), E (energy). I had heard of the footballer, and got thoroughly distracted by failing to lift and separate. I hadn’t heard of Lorenzo Costa, which didn’t help.
16 Film popular side like Roy’s boys this year?
INSIDE OUT – IN (popular), SIDE (side!!), OUT (like Roy’s boys this year). Great film, not such a great clue.
17 Local wearing whitish City sports top
PINNACLE – tricky matryoshka wordplay here: C (City) ‘sports’ (i.e. is wearing) INN (local) which in turn is ‘wearing’ PALE.
20 Put away rebound finally after save
STORED – STORE, rebounD. Another weak clue, I thought: the meanings of ‘store’ are too close together.
22 One charged about park to secure Portugal a point
IPPON – ION (one charged) containing P (park), and then all of that containing (securing) P (Portugal). Just as I get used to the rule that any abbreviation is OK as long as it’s in Collins, along comes one that isn’t. It’s in ODO though and it won’t bother anyone like me who drives an automatic car. From what I remember of doing Judo as a kid IPPON is a bit more than a point, but again it’s close enough.
24 Missile picked up by European groundsman?
TRADE – reversal of DART, E.

34 comments on “Sunday Times 4702 by David McLean – special one”

  1. When I saw the name of the setter I was expecting this to be difficult and I wasn’t disappointed. I found it very hard going with quite a few unsatisfactorily parsed, others bunged in on a wing and a prayer and 22d unsolved. Not much specific knowledge of the theme necessary, but it was good to see the related Nina.

    I prefer themes to be hidden in the answers rather than signposted in the clues, but having football references in every clue was a real feat and no complaints from me.

    Thanks to setter and blogger.

  2. 1ac GLOSSY did go in very easily as noted by keriothe.

    5dn SWEET FANNY ADAMS was excellent.

    After that this faux-themed nightmare was the least enjoyable time I have ever spent on a so-called crossword. And I like footie and sport. Verlaine was mortified!

    The quality of setting was well down – 21ac NATION! What a turkey!

    22dn IPPON was random with SFA of a clue.

    27ac do WRINGERS press? Not in my book!

    19ac STEP is still a mystery to me – keroithe?

    The NINA wasn’t terribly elegant either and I imagine few saw it.

    David McClean – are you Arsene Wenger in disguise?

    For your next theme why not try philately or Chinese pottery and amuse us all further!

    Too clever by half!

    horryd Shanghai Xinhua

    1. I see I failed to explain where the removed E comes from – now corrected.
  3. I was pleased that all my answers were correct, anyway (I quit with seven clues unsolved, and in general un-understood). I have nothing against themed crosswords in general, and it’s my misfortune that I’m ignorant of soccer. But. I remember a cryptic where several of the solutions were the names of cricketers (if I recall correctly), none of whom I’d ever heard of; but that was fine, since the clues enabled me to solve. Here some of the clues were for me impenetrable. And I do think that 21ac and 16d are poor clues. And although the anagram in 5d is splendid, SFA just means ‘Sweet Fanny Adams’ (does it mean anything else?); which makes for a weak clue, in my book. And wringing is certainly not anything like pressing.
    1. There is another definition, as you may now know, but it ain’t in this clue!
  4. This was a yawn fest as far as I was concerned, but enough of that, as I managed to solve it correctly even if I didn’t understand all of it.

    Unless I have missed something I’d add 24dn to the list of feeble clues. “Groundsman” = TRADE. Really?

    On the other hand I’d defend “They press” = WRINGERS, as criticised above. The verb “to wring” can be defined as: “Extract (the moisture) from something wet (esp. wet clothes) by squeezing or by twisting”. And squeezing can be simply applying pressure or pressing. Also a wringer aka mangle removes water from wet clothes by a process of pressing / squeezing.

    Finally I’m mystified as to what more needs to be explained about “action” = STEP.

    Edited at 2016-07-17 04:34 am (UTC)

    1. Even though I quite enjoyed this puzzle; and had none of the qualms I was surprised to find on the Forum and here … I still didn’t get that one at all. Could someone please explain?
      1. Unless I’m missing something it’s a straight definition by example and could just as easily have been “ice-cream salesman”, except that it had to have something to do with the theme, of course.

        Edited at 2016-07-17 05:26 am (UTC)

    2. I’d have to agree that 24dn isn’t the strongest of clues, and a good example of how the need to follow the theme leads to the use of a device that would probably be avoided otherwise. At least the DBE is indicated.
      To PRESS also means to extract juice from, which was about the closest I could get to wringing. But of course you’d never talk about wringing apples.

      Edited at 2016-07-17 08:02 am (UTC)

      1. This may be of interest, from SOED

        wring. noun 1:

        1 A cider press; a wine press. OE.

        2 A cheese press. L19.

        1. That is interesting, thanks. It helps confirm my initial hunch (which I confess I didn’t bother to check) that the meanings are close.
          I’ve also just noticed that ODO gives the following definitions:
          > Press: squeeze (someone’s arm or hand) as a sign of affection
          > Wring: squeeze (someone’s hand) tightly, especially with sincere emotion
          These meanings are pretty much identical, so in this send you could say that a WRINGER might be pressing someone’s hand.
  6. I quite liked it, and although a footie watcher I missed some of the theme stuff, I just solved the clues. About 40 minutes I seem to remember, but had to check up on IPPON got from the word play, at the end.
  7. ….enlightenment finally! Thank you, keriothe. I think your comments are spot on. BTW, you must be pleased to see so many comments on week-old puzzle. Sometimes there are as many as a meeting of Lib Dem MPs. Yes, there were a vast number of adverse comments on the club forum but I took the view that, first of all, a themed puzzle is no bad thing once in a while and, secondly, that if I can’t solve a cryptic, it is my problem not the setter’s. I don’t include the TLS or the Mephisto in that as both are beyond my ken.
    I printed my solution and used a highlighter to indicate those clues I couldn’t parse properly. The page was a mass of pink, so thank you for clearing up the confusion.
    The two that baffled me completely and which I thought must be wrong were STEP and WRINGERS. In desperation to enter something, anything, I put SUED (‘costly action’?) and PRINTERS (‘They press’?) As for OLD MASTER, I got it right but had to read your explanation 2 or 3 times to understand how!
    I did like 5d. As jackkt says, there’s another explanation for SFA, but it certainly didn’t fit here!
    1. Oh, in my innocence I wasn’t thinking of that one, Martin. There’s something currently under wraps in another prize puzzle that will emerge here in due course.
  8. Thanks Keriothe – that is a typically good blog for a puzzle you didn’t especially like.

    As I said last week, I did like the puzzle (excepting NATION). We don’t see themed clues as often as themed answers, but I like them better – they take ingenuity on the part of the setter, and they don’t direct the solving to a small set of possible answers. Looking back, I don’t see any of the clues that require any knowledge of football whatsoever, other than AMERICAN, so I don’t completely understand what some people found unpleasant.

    But a question to jackkt and Martin – I had thought that Sweet Fanny Adams was just a (semi)polite euphemism for the other one. Am I missing something?

    And, thank you Harry (and I assume, Peter)

  9. Ok, it wasn’t my type of puzzle, but I’d rather take the opportunity to point out what a breath of fresh air Dirty Harry has been since his puzzles started appearing here. Consistently creative, challenging, fun puzzles.

    THANK YOU setter! And nice blog K.

    1. Whoops, Dirty Harry was Callahan, not McLean. So our setter is just Harry, without the Dirty.

      Still, he makes my day.

      1. Speaking as an outsider, I don’t understand how David McLean gets to be called Harry. Could someone explain please? And as an aside, do Jeff Pearce and Dean Mayer have monikers other than Jeff and Dean too?
        Thanks in anticipation.
        1. I don’t know either: I picked it up from here. It’s definitely legit though: he sometimes signs himself off as Harry on his website: see here for example.
  10. Looking this over, my eyes instantly glazed over. It actually took me a second to realize why I seemed to find the whole thing so uninviting (I’d almost say “repulsive”). When I realized what was going on, I gave myself a pass on this one and have not really tried to work it (did get seven of them anyway).

    Edited at 2016-07-17 03:50 pm (UTC)

  11. As indicated elsewhere, this was not my cup of tea but fair do’s to Harry; it was a skillfull setting operation. Saw the GERMAN NINA but did not continue around, hence the completely missed STEP. Thanks Harry and keriothe, although happy to be back on track today.
  12. Count me among the fans – I loved it. Always pleased when something a bit out of the ordinary appears, and can never quite believe how many people think civilization as we know it is coming to an end when it does!

    It could be argued that the Nina is a generalisation (at least against us in major competitions) rather than a prediction. And he hedged his bets with the surface of 1ac as well!

    1. Fair point. I suppose from an Italian point of view the prediction was entirely accurate!
  13. I agree that was a brave attempt at a themed puzzle, which didn’t quite work as evidently some of the answers couldn’t be clued satisfactorily with this restraint. The thematic aspect should have alerted me to the existence of the Nina, so not seeing it left me with my one error at 19a. (Knowing no footballers led me to guess SUEZ, assuming there was someone named SU*EZ.)
  14. I know this post is a full 11 days after most of the preceding posts (although only 4 or 5 days after the publication date in Australia), but I thought it worth giving the blogger, if no-one else, the view of a solver who has probably seen it all.
    This is a shining example of how not to compile a themed crossword. At least the first golden rule of themed crosswords was not broken: solving it did not depend on either knowing or having to ‘solve’ the theme. However, the second golden rule was broken: it led the compiler to saturate the wordplay in the clues with themed references, to the obvious detriment of the quality and fairness of the clues.
    As always, I would like to highlight some really good clues: 5A (SVENGALI), 12A (EVEN SO) and 7D (GAFFE). Many others were OK if you were prepared to overlook the contrived way in which the theme was incorporated. 5D (SWEET FANNY ADAMS) was awful and 21A (NATION) even worse.

    It would be interesting to guess what proportion of solvers actually found the theme interesting. (I did not, but that’s just me, and I can’t make a valid criticism on that account.)

    I haven’t yet read the ‘impassioned defence’ of this crossword by Dean Mayer, but I can’t wait to do so after posting this.

    Thanks for the blog.

    Alan Browne

    1. Thanks Alan. From comments here and on the club forum I would say that yours (ours) is the majority view. However there are plenty of people who enjoyed the theme so it would be a bit churlish to deny these people their fun, particularly as it was a such big day in the world of football.
      1. It’s good of you to reply after the page was long-dead. I too would not be so churlish as to deny people’s enjoyment of the theme, but I was shocked at the quality of the clueing compared with the crossword I recently solved by the same setter (was it 2 weeks ago?). I’m usually tolerant of a few doubtful bits of wordplay (as an occasional setter it behoves me to be so), but this puzzle really needed more care. Most points I could have made were made by others, but from memory (I’ve lost my rough notes) I think I had a few more.
        I can never give a solving time, by the way, because I never complete a puzzle in one session – unless it’s too easy.
        Alan Browne
  15. ……….attempt at a cryptic. 9 unsolved but that is more an indication of OUR limitations rather than the quality of the puzzle. My knowledge of football kept misdirecting me.

    Jan & Tom. Toronto

  16. The Sunday Times puzzles are published in my local paper (Toronto, Canada) without the setter’s name. After l read in livejournal that the setter of ST 4702 was named Harry, l happened to notice the two symmetrical “H’s” in the dark squares of the crossword grid. Checking back, previous puzzles seem to show “T’s” and possibly “L’s.” I’m curious as to whether the selection of a particular crossword grid by the setter is random, or if it is indeed designed to show the setter’s initial?
  17. Themed puzzles: OK occasionally, but not really to my taste.
    Poor clues: Never! As others have said, a few not quite up to standard.
    It can be done (quick google) Times 24836 has every single clue themed about the wedding of Kate Middleton & A Prince, and the clues are of Times daily standard.
    Rob

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