Times Cryptic 29400 – Sat, 29 November 2025. TGI(not)F.

Author   branchPosted on Categories Weekend Cryptic

Another Saturday that contrasted nicely with the Fierce Friday on the day before. Thanks to the setter. How did you get on?

Note for newcomers: The Times offers prizes for Saturday Cryptic Crosswords. This blog is for last week’s puzzle, posted after the competition closes. So, please don’t comment here on this week’s Saturday Cryptic.

Definitions are in bold and underlined. With the luxury of a week to do the blog, I can expand on how the wordplay works, so instructions copied from the clues to show how to get the answer appear thus. Anagram material is (THUS)*. A ^ symbol indicates where text is to be inserted.

Across
1 Not for the first time, lose confidence in fortification (7)
REDOUBT – cryptic hint, based on the idea of RE-DOUBTing!
5 American choirboy nearly rejected by a province (7)
ALBERTA – A [American] + TREBLE [choirboy, nearly] + A [in the clue], all backwards (rejected).
9 A useless board ousting leader is possible to prevent (9)
AVOIDABLE – A [in the clue] + VOID [useless] + TABLE [board, ousting leader].
10 Only a little fuel in rocket for the moment (2,3)
SO FAR – F [only a little Fuel] in SO^AR [rocket].
11 Failure of more soldiers taking part in retreat (5)
LOSER – hidden (taking part), backwards (in retreat).
12 People who’ve paid for event fail to go without being asked to (9)
GATECRASH – GATE [people who’ve paid for event] + CRASH [fail].
14 Sailor cursed clumsy American intern (7,7)
ANCIENT MARINER – anagram (clumsy): (AMERICAN INTERN)*
17 Formal wear matching furniture almost entirely (5-5,4)
THREE PIECE SUIT – a THREE PIECE SUITE is typically a sofa and two armchairs. Use all but the last letter (almost entirely).
21 Lands in safety vessel (9)
LIGHTSHIP – LIGHTS + HIP [in fashion].
23 Award nothing, bad mark (5)
OSCAR – O [nothing] + SCAR [bad mark].
24 Sulphur, foul-smelling and compact (5)
SOLID – S [chemical symbol for sulphur] + OLID [foul-smelling; a word we meet only in crosswords].
25 United in caressing abandoned child (9)
FOUNDLING – U in FO^NDLING.
26 Small request for aerosol (7)
SPRAYER – S + PRAYER.
27 Getting on TV, not at first receiving colour back (7)
ELDERLY – TEL^LY [TV, not at first] receiving DER [RED, back].
Down
1 Bank calling in a loan upfront? That surprises me (6)
REALLY – RE^LY [bank, as in “bank on”] containing (calling in) A+L [Loan, upfront]
2 Casually stops by with request for repentance (5,2)
DROPS IN – “Repent! DROP SIN!”.
3 Weaken effect of ceremonial trim after short reverse (9)
UNDERMINE – ERMINE [ceremonial trim] after UNDO [undo=reverse, short].
4 In the first place, I tighten bow that’s loose (2,5,4)
TO BEGIN WITH – anagram (loose): (I TIGHTEN BOW)*
5 Dismiss formal test looking up missing marks (3)
AXE – EXAM, missing M, up.
6 Back in the old days, investment not complicated (5)
BASIC – ASI [ISA, back] in B^C. [the very old days].
7 Run iron over top half of mac? Don’t! (7)
REFRAIN – R [run] + EF [FE, the chemical symbol for iron, over] + RAINCOAT [top half of MACINTOSH].
8 Your quiet fury, after answer divided county (8)
AYRSHIRE – YR + SH + IRE after A. All standard componenets, assembled as directed.
I misread “country” instead of “county”, which slowed me down!
13 Speculate wildly about one minute object maybe buried in foundations (4,7)
TIME CAPSULE – anagram (wildly): (SPECULATE)* about IM.
15 Came back bloody, holding foot with end of toe severed (9)
RESPONDED – RE^D [bloody] holding SPONDEE [a foot of poetry, with the toE, severed].
16 Pen catalogues for elegant writers (8)
STYLISTS – STY [pen] + LISTS [catalogues].
18 Soldier’s ridiculously larger uniform (7)
REGULAR – anagram (ridiculously): (LARGER U)*
19 More irritating vessel one fills having no lid (7)
ITCHIER – I [one] fills PITCH^ER.
20 Show sadness about a good couple like Cliff and Ben perhaps (6)
CRAGGY – CR^Y about AGG.
22 Now sycophant gets daughter up (5)
TODAY – TOADY, with the D relocated.
25 Fine Irish? This could be Scotch (3)
FIR – F + IR.

14 comments on “Times Cryptic 29400 – Sat, 29 November 2025. TGI(not)F.”

  1. 32:40
    the last 7′ of which were spent on SOLID & CRAGGY. Biffed UNDERMINE, parsed post-submission.

  2. Another Saturday sweetspot. Not as good as the last Saturday, but still.
    Liked 14ac ANCIENT MARINER – a reference even I could warm to, and the THREE PIECE SUIT 17ac was cute. Thought 25ac FOUNDLING clean and effective, as was 2d DROPS IN and 19d ITCHIER.
    Had to come here for TREBLE from ‘choir boy’ – even though guessed the answer to 5ac. Not so fussed on construction in 7d REFRAIN – even though we did parse correctly. A little UK knowledge would help for 20d ‘Ben’ (Nevis?), ‘spondee’ in 15d RESPONDED a bit tough for some without research, and ‘telly’ seems now established for here in 27ac ELDERLY.
    Thank you branch and setter.

    1. A ‘ben’ is a mountain – Ben Nevis is Mount Nevis. More usually used in Scotland as originates from the Gaelic, but generally understood in the UK.

  3. 26 minutes, all parsed. Another enjoyable Saturday puzzle.
    COD RESPONDED for inventive, if gruesome, surface. Also admired REFRAIN.

  4. This was a great puzzle with just the right degree of challenge.
    I’m getting rather irritated by the level of difficulty presented by the Friday crosswords – yesterday was a prime example. I appreciate that expert solvers will relish these more difficult ones, but I suspect that there is a large group of less talented solvers who are beginning to switch off, come Friday.

    1. You can put me firmly in that category TW. I enjoy doing The Times crossword most days, and I can typically do it in something between 30-45 minutes (sometimes quicker and sometimes slower) but recently I have been taking one look at the Friday offering and sticking it in the round file. Life is too short.

      1. Me too, TW and AJ! Most solvers turned off when it came to tackling the Age Newspaper Friday offering by DA for this very same reason.

        1. not me, especially at this time of year when the monsoon is upon us. I’m either hiding in the aircon or trying to hear the tv or radio over the incessant noise of rain, so even a forlorn hope of solving is a welcome distraction.

  5. Had a bit of a MER at rocket=soar, but no other worries. LOI by a long way was THREE-PIECE SUIT, which completely passed me by. Yet so obvious in retrospect. I’d forgotten spondee and couldn’t understand UNDERMINE, so those were bifd and post-parsed. If I did know olid, I’d forgotten it, but the answer was obvious. I admired BASIC, REFRAIN, CRAGGY and AYRSHIRE a lot for their smooth surfaces and clever wordplay, though the latter puzzled me a while, as I mis-read it as ‘country’. An excellent puzzle.

  6. 15 minutes.

    – Had to trust that olid means foul-smelling to get SOLID
    – Feel like FOUNDLING isn’t a word we see very often these days
    – Biffed RESPONDED from the checkers as I didn’t know spondee

    Thanks branch and setter.

    FOI Redoubt
    LOI Ancient Mariner
    COD Time capsule

  7. My Seiko solver, with 250,000 words, didn’t have olid, but it was the only thing that fit so I assumed it was another Times special.

  8. 10.07

    Straightforward but enjoyable. Didn’t know OLID but it had to be.

    Thanks Bruce/setter.

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