Another no-show by the scheduled blogger so another simple analysis of the clues, with no commentary due to time constraints. Sorry!
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Across
8 Foul shot’s over line, tennis officials maintained – one loses on grass (8)
TELLTALE – LET (foul shot) reversed (over) L (line) around (maintained) LTA (tennis officials) plus [on]E (one loses on)
9 It’s seen in rugby – one likes to start with the Haka, say (6)
RITUAL – IT in (seen in) RU (rugby) A (one) L[ikes] (likes to start)
10 Second week inside the bubble (6)
SEETHE – S (second) [w]EE[k] (week inside) THE
11 Metal sheet‘s in place in gallery (3,5)
TIN PLATE – IN PL (place) in TATE (gallery)
12 One played doctor in Scottish town, putting an end to disease (8)
TROMBONE – MB (doctor) in TROON (Scottish town) [diseas]E (end to disease)
13 Inch closer to lights at first, then put your foot down (6)
INSIST – IN (inch) [light]S (closer to lights) IST (first)
14 Hero – a regular? (6-2-3-4)
MIDDLE-OF-THE-ROAD – ‘hero a’ is in the MIDDLE-OF-THE–ROAD
18 Spot serviceman breaking into country house (6)
PIMPLE – MP (serviceman) in (breaking into) PILE (country house)
20 Surrender old licence, initially left in car (4,4)
ROLL OVER – O (old) L[icence] (licence, initially) L (left) in ROVER (car)
23 Chap turns to ‘Big John’, a former statesman (8)
YUGOSLAV – GUY (chap) reversed (turns) OS (big) LAV (john)
24 Phone coach back, making arrangement for accommodation (6)
SUBLET – TEL (phone) BUS (coach) reversed (back)
25 Tardis, somehow leaving dimension, succeeded in being Daleks’ nemesis? (6)
STAIRS – an anagram (somehow) of TAR[d]IS plus S (succeeded)
26 End of semester? (8)
TERMINUS – TERM IN US (semester)
Down
1 Nice and simple in the end, with short extra cover bringing streaker down to earth (6)
METEOR – ET (Nice and) [simpl]E (simple in the end) in (with … cover) MOR[e] (short extra)
2 Signal ultimately limited at sea – that’s inconvenient (3-5)
ILL-TIMED – an anagram (at sea) of [signa]L LIMITED
3 Some structure displayed by England, blocking Gareth Bale’s header – no score (6)
GAZEBO – E (England) in (blocking) GAZ (Gareth) B[ale] (Bale’s header) plus O (no score)
4 Pivot, essentially, provides balance point (6,2,7)
CENTRE OF GRAVITY – [pi]V[ot] (pivot, essentially) is the CENTRE OF GRAVITY
5 High-fibre meal required for sport? (8)
BRANDISH – BRAN DISH (high-fibre meal)
6 Point of contact for those on deck? (6)
STYLUS – cryptic def. referring to a record player
7 To the north of continent, find cooler temperature for work (8)
FANTASIA – FAN (cooler) T (temperature) ASIA (continent)
15 Injustice shown when sacking leader – can I leave on the 25th? (8)
INIQUITY – [t]IN (sacking leader – can) I QUIT (I leave) Y (the 25th {letter})
16 I listened to composer – one that may alter one’s view (8)
EYEGLASS – EYE sounds like (listened to) ‘I’ plus GLASS (composer)
17 Shape of fancy hotel room I’d booked originally (8)
RHOMBOID – an anagram (fancy) of H (hotel) ROOM I’D B[ooked] (booked originally)
19 Sick of trip? Then return! (6)
PROFIT – an anagram (sick) of OF TRIP
21 Baseball players get caught out – they’re not likely to win (6)
LOSERS – [c]LOSERS (baseball players get caught out)
22 Husband? Every other week he goes on strike (3,3)
EKE OUT – alternate letters in (every other … goes) wEeK hE plus OUT (on strike)
We found this a medium-difficulty puzzle with some head-scratching needed. The NW corner proved trickiest till we realised the foul shot in 8ac was from tennis, not snooker and the grass was a person, not a plant. We thought ‘Nice’ in 1dn could be an indication of French but it took a while for METEOR to occur to us – we were thinking of a lightning flash as the ‘streaker to earth’. SEETHE was our LOI.
We really liked the intersecting long answers. CENTRE OF GRAVITY was the first of the two we got, then we realised the clue for MIDDLE OF THE ROAD was constructed on the same lines – Brilliant!
Other favourites included RHOMBOID (once we realised it didn’t end in ‘morph’), STYLUS and TROMBONE.
Thanks, Anglio and Gaufrid
Lots of tough clues, but managed to finish. TELLTALE was my LOI. A couple of errors in blog. In 14a, HERO A not just HERO is needed (this clue has appeared before somewhere) and in 25a the final S comes from ‘succeeded’. Wasn’t keen on clueing O in 3d by ‘zero score’. Also thought ‘sport’ for ‘brandish’ was maybe pushing it a little but I may be picking hairs.
Altogether, a great crossword. So thanks to S&B.
Hovis @2
Thanks. That was how I parsed 14ac and 25ac when I solved the puzzle but didn’t remember when I came to write this post (which I did in somewhat of a hurry otherwise I wouldn’t have had a meal prepared for this evening). I will make the necessary corrections.
I found this very tough and needed to cheat a lot on the top half to finish.
I’m curious about 21dn. I’m a baseball fan so I know about closers but I wonder how well known the term is generally.
We weren’t too worried by 21dn, having come across closers before, though it may only have been in crosswordland. But we did wonder briefly if MP (= military policeman) as a serviceman rather than a politician was well enough known. And, on a lighter note, if solvers knew the implication of STAIRS being Daleks’ nemesis.
Well, I do remember the episode of Doctor Who in the eighties where someone is running away from a dalek and they run up the stairs – and the dalek floats up the stairs following them.
Incidentally, a closer is a pitcher who comes on the pitch in the final inning of a game of baseball and if he gets three outs without his team losing the game, then he is said to have saved the game. I think “number of saves” is one of the more specious statistics in a game heavy in statistics.
” they run up the stairs – and the dalek floats up the stairs following them” – but that wasn’t a possibility in some of the earlier series!
We never saw it happen in the earlier series. That’s not the same thing.
Thanks to Gaufrid for stepping in to provide a very tidy analysis and thanks to everyone for the comments – it’s a treat for me to see solvers’ feedback and it’s always interesting to know how the puzzle has been received.
All fair comments. A couple of slightly tenuous or obscure clues, I agree, but hopefully no serious crimes were committed!
As for the Daleks reference, I was a child of the 70s, so I don’t think they floated back then. I think I stopped watching it when Tom Baker left…
A classic moment when the Dalek croaked ‘ELEVA-A-ATE’ in its imitable tones, floated up and zapped the expendable one. Hilarious.