Very strange goings-on at The Times today as 9 Down clues may be missing depending on how you access this puzzle. The only way I have found to see them all (leaving aside the e-paper) is in the Crossword Club and solve online, but if you try to print from there they go missing again. I have reported this in the Club Forum but I’m not sure how closely this is monitored these days.
Update @09:46 The problem seems ot have been sorted now.
Solving time: 67 minutes with one resorts to aids
Apart from a couple of answers I shall mention below, having written the blog I can see little here to account for my excessive solving time. But sometimes seeing all those empty squares needing to be filled can be quite intimidating! How did you do?
As usual definitions are underlined in bold italics, {deletions and substitutions are in curly brackets} and [anagrinds, containment, reversal and other indicators in square ones]. “Aural wordplay” is in quotation marks. I usually omit all reference to juxtaposition indicators unless there is a specific point that requires clarification.
 Across |
|
| 1 | Secret clique led by Democrat in China? (6,3) |
| DINNER SET | |
| D (Democrat), INNER (secret), SET (clique) | |
| 6 | Old lady on organ is hot stuff (5) |
| MAGMA | |
| MAG (organ – magazine), MA (old lady) | |
| 9 | Eats in the afternoon (4,3) |
| HIGH TEA | |
| Cryptic. POD: High tea is a meal eaten in the late afternoon or early evening, typically consisting of a cooked dish, bread and butter, and tea. | |
| 10 | Definitely 50 per cent off (3,4) |
| NOT HALF | |
| Two meanings. ‘Not half’ is informal slang meaning ‘very much so’. | |
| 11 | Area left covered in sheets (5) |
| REALM | |
| L (left) contained by [covered in] REAM (sheets of paper) | |
| 13 | He directs opening of Titanic, remade on a train (9) |
| TARANTINO | |
| T{itanic} [opening of…], anagram [remade] ON A TRAIN | |
| 14 | Deficit curtailed season on Broadway (9) |
| SHORTFALL | |
| SHORT (curtailed), FALL (season, on Broadway i.e. an Americanism) | |
| 16 | Savage beast’s last gasp (4) |
| PANT | |
| PAN (savage – e.g. give something a bad review), {beas}T [last] | |
| 18 | See you in transit at airport (2-2) |
| TA-TA | |
| Hidden [in] {transi}T AT A{irport} | |
| 19 | Bull inspiring wonder and laughter (9) |
| GUFFAWING | |
| GUFF (bull – BS), AWING (inspiring wonder) | |
| 22 | Guy charged with current murder is copper’s source (9) |
| MALACHITE | |
| MALE (guy) containing [charged with] AC (current) + HIT (murder). I didn’t associate this mineral with copper so I had to wait for checkers and construct the answer from wordplay. | |
| 24 | Modern Madras’s boundless colour (5) |
| HENNA | |
| {c}HENNA{i} (modern Madras) [boundless]. This was the one I used aids for as I couldn’t remember the city’s new name. I was never going to get to it from wordplay because HENNA clued as a colour rather than a dye would not have occurred to me. | |
| 25 | Rather frail married couple welcoming each brief kiss (7) |
| WEAKISH | |
| W+ H (married couple – wife / husband) containing [welcoming] EA (each) + KIS{s} [brief] | |
| 26 | Half-blind from love, yet endlessly in distress (3-4) |
| ONE-EYED | |
| 0 (love – in tennis) then YE{t} [endlessly] contained by [in] NEED (distress) | |
| 28 | Charge round room after case of stout (5) |
| STORM | |
| S{tou}T [case of…], O (round}, RM (room). Storm the barricades! | |
| 29 | Pickled nut, dreary fare (3,6) |
| DAY RETURN | |
| Anagram [pickled] of NUT DREARY. Aka a Cheap Day Return. |
|
| Down |
|
| 1 | Her son goes crazy with daughter ahead in polls (7) |
| DEHORNS | |
| D (daughter), anagram [goes crazy] of HER SON. POD: Poll – cut the horns off an animal, especially a young cow. |
|
| 2 | Alcohol and orgy regularly banned (3) |
| NOG | |
| {a}N{d} O{r}G{y} [regularly banned]. This can be a type of beer or short for an egg-nog, a hot or cold alcoholic drink with added egg. | |
| 3 | Value one’s manor houses (8) |
| ESTIMATE | |
| ESTATE (manor) contains [houses] I’M (one’s) | |
| 4 | Not much study time (5) |
| SCANT | |
| SCAN (study), T (time) | |
| 5 | Sign for staff meaning break cut short (5,4) |
| TENOR CLEF | |
| TENOR (meaning), CLEF{t} (break} [cut short]. The staff or stave is the set of 5 lines on which music is notated. A clef indicates the pitch of the notes written on it. Most music is written in the treble or bass clef but a tenor clef can be used for passages in the higher range of several instruments such as cello, bassoon and trombone. Violas use the alto clef. | |
| 6 | Dog biting American man’s backside for sport (6) |
| MUTANT | |
| MUTT (dog) containing [biting] A (American) + {ma}N [’s backside]. I had no idea about the definition here but have since found this in SOED: sport (biology): A plant (or part of a plant), animal, etc., which exhibits some abnormal or striking variation from the parent stock or type, esp. in form or colour; a spontaneous mutation; a new variety produced in this way. NHO this. | |
| 7 | Force poor navigator to adopt new way of processing data (11) |
| GRAVITATION | |
| Anagram [poor] of NAVIGATOR containing [to adopt] IT (new way of processing data). Seriously misleading use of ‘new’ here to indicate IT! | |
| 8 | Slight cockiness after first-class foxtrot (7) |
| AFFRONT | |
| A (first-class), F (foxtrot – NATO alphabet), FRONT (cockiness). An action or remark that causes outrage or offence. | |
| 12 | Naughty Lolita, mad on sherry (11) |
| AMONTILLADO | |
| Anagram [naughty] of LOLITA MAD ON | |
| 15 | British leaving African capital, lost and in distress (9) |
| ANGUISHED | |
| {B}ANGUI (African capital of Central African Republic) [British leaving], SHED (lost). NHO this place so I had to wait for checkers. | |
| 17 | Wool caught on tree by lake (8) |
| CASHMERE | |
| C (caught), ASH (tree), MERE (lake) | |
| 18 | Understood issue coming up in the past (4,3) |
| TIME WAS | |
| SAW (understood) + EMIT (issue) reversed [coming up] | |
| 20 | Cheer dad, cycling in valley (7) |
| GLADDEN | |
| ADD (DAD cycling) contained by [in] GLEN (valley) | |
| 21 | School teaching division (6) |
| SCHISM | |
| SCH (school), ISM (teaching) | |
| 23 | Celebrity’s second spare jet (5) |
| EBONY | |
| {c}E{lebrity’s} [second], BONY (spare). Black. | |
| 27 | One letter read aloud (3) |
| YOU | |
| Aural wordplay [read aloud] “U” (letter). One / you may say that. | |
In our online Times (one on iPad, the other on a Samsung tablet), the cryptic crossword was missing altogether.
It was misplaced with the puzzles on the Concise page. I brought this to their attention early morning but they’ve done nothing to rectify it.