My third time covering Bradman, another great grid to finish the working week with. Thanks Bradman for a pleasurable solve. Just touched down in Tokyo a couple of hours back and immediately got to a wifi enabled location to get my fix for the day. There were several clues that I quite liked, especially 1d and 5a. A nice play on words can be found at 25a. As always, very happy to see any improvements on parsing that you guys can help with.
| Across | ||
| 1 | DEBATED | Argued about exploit outside club (7) |
| DEED (exploit) outside BAT (club) | ||
| 5 | CENTRED | Two similar coins half way across? (7) |
| Interesting clue this – charade of CENT and RED, two coins with little value. Red here refers to Red Cent, American slang for trivial money. | ||
| 9 | FALLA | Composer putting everything into two notes (5) |
| ALL (everything) in FA (two notes) – Spanish composer Manuel de Falla | ||
| 10 | SCREWBALL | What spin bowler wants to do as an odd fellow? (9) |
| (cryptic def?) double def – what spin bowler wants to do is to screwball – ball pitched with reverse spin. An odd fellow is also called a screwball. | ||
| 11 | CHAPERONE | Fellow, one to protect Queen as attendant (9) |
| CHAP (fellow) ONE around ER (protect Queen) | ||
| 12 | PETRA | Old city type, tramp frayed at the edges (5) |
| Hidden in tyPE TRAmp (frayed at the edges, without tr and mp), Iconic old city in Jordan | ||
| 13 | OMENS | Warnings thus rejected, soldiers will be trapped (5) |
| OS (thus = so, rejected) containing MEN (soldiers will be trapped) | ||
| 15 | RUBBISHED | Irritation with mistake – top journalist severely criticised (9) |
| RUB (irritation) BISH (mistake) ED (top journalist) | ||
| 18 | PARCHMENT | Mum or Dad wrapping children maybe initially in goatskin? (9) |
| PARENT ( mum or dad) wrapping CH (children) M ( maybe initially) | ||
| 19 | TYROS | Learners incorporated into duty roster (5) |
| Hidden in duTY ROSters | ||
| 21 | NOVEL | Book of the month starts to excite librarians (5) |
| NOV (November – month) EL (starts = initial characters of Excite Librarians) | ||
| 23 | COHABITEE | Flat mate? A techie with BO unfortunately (9) |
| Anagram of A TECHIE BO | ||
| 25 | CANDIDATE | Is girl able to go out with a prospective employee? (9) |
| CAN DI DATE(?) – cryptic wording for “is girl able to go out(?)”, Di short for Diana. | ||
| 26 | REBEL | Stagger to contain British anarchist? (5) |
| REEL (stagger) containing B (British) | ||
| 27 | AVENGER | State restricts English person wanting justice through violence? (7) |
| AVER (state) containing ENG (restricts English) | ||
| 28 | TRAGEDY | Attempt to conceal old event causing great pain (7) |
| TRY(attempt) concealing AGED(old) | ||
| Down | ||
| 1 | DE FACTO | In reality, nasty two-faced women will be shunned (2,5) |
| Anagram of TwO FACED (less w, women will be shunned) | ||
| 2 | BALLADEER | Singer terrible, always swallowing a couple of lines (9) |
| BAD (terrible) EER(always=ever, e’er) swallowing A LL (a couple of lines) | ||
| 3 | TRACE | Suggestion of rain? Time to run (5) |
| T (time) RACE (run) | ||
| 4 | DISCOURSE | Conversation is so crude, out of order (9) |
| Anagram of IS SO CRUDE | ||
| 5 | CURSE | Profanity comes from scoundrels taking drug (5) |
| CURS (scoundrels) taking E (drug, Ecstacy) | ||
| 6 | NEWSPRINT | Innovative sort of athletics event in paper (9) |
| NEW (innovative) SPRINT (sort of athletics event) | ||
| 7 | ROAST | Cook presents browned bread with new topping (5) |
| tOAST ( browned bread) with new topping, i.e. First letter is changed. | ||
| 8 | DULLARD | A time wasted by grown-up – fat person with little intelligence (7) |
| a]DUL[t (grown-up without A T) LARD (fat) | ||
| 14 | SCHILLING | Society getting scary – money no longer available (9) |
| S (society) CHILLING (scary) – old Austrian currency | ||
| 16 | BITCHIEST | Desire one found in famous old footballer to be most spiteful (9) |
| ITCH (desire) I (one) in BEST (famous old footballer, George Best) | ||
| 17 | HERITABLE | The woman’s single item of furniture that could be passed to offspring (9) |
| HER (woman) I (single) TABLE (item of furniture) | ||
| 18 | PANACEA | Pagan god, star performer with a cure for everything (7) |
| PAN (pagan god) ACE (star performer) with A | ||
| 20 | SHELLEY | Poet certainly upset about place of the damned (7) |
| SEY (certainly = yes, upset) about HELL (place of the damned) | ||
| 22 | VENUE | Planet ultimately lacking, energy limited – conference here? (5) |
| VENUs ( planet ultimately lacking) E ( Energy limited) | ||
| 23 | CHAIR | Presiding officer in church broadcast (5) |
| CH (church) AIR (broadcast) | ||
| 24 | BURMA | Country’s medical organisation outside the old city (5) |
| BMA ( medical organization, British Medical Association) outside UR ( old city) | ||
*anagram
Thanks Bradman and Turbolegs – good stuff, both. Nice to see PANACEA correctly defined (in contrast to the execrable “universal panacea”). That’s my bit of pedantry for today!
Thanks both .
For 9ac I initially had – FA(U)RE-.
Good sound crossword -nothing too difficult.
I got practically nowhere with this. I didn’t know falla, bish balladeer or red for coin and not knowing words doesn’t help though I know it doesn’t ruffle the better solvers.
I failed to spot the hidden words at 12& 19 which is the equivalent of missing a penalty.
I was convinced that the old footballer would be pele.
I’ll put it down to Friday exhaustion.
It would be rude to call this easy: for someone like me with deadlines it was a delightful amble between interruptions, just what the spirit needs. A real panacea. Thanks, Bradman; and, of course, poor Turbolegs, who meets a deadline on behalf of all of us.
Lovely stuff as usual from Bradman and very nicely blogged. Can’t see anyone improving on the parsing!
Thanks everyone, I did enjoy taking a crack at this one.
Bamberger – I can understand. It wasn’t a walk in the park for me either and for some of the clues, I had to complete the parsing explanation after looking around on the internet. Like you, I also went with Pele for old footballer but with cross refs (I had ****H*E*T when I solved it) quickly knew that it was someone else. Likewise, my learning for the day yesterday was ‘Bish’ means mistake which I was forced to deduce to fit the clue and later confirmed on Google.