Guardian 27,701 / Picaroon

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I haven’t blogged on Boxing Day before and I was quite surprised to be reminded that there is a paper today. After a most enjoyable day yesterday, I have no social commitments until later in the day and so it was very pleasant to find a puzzle from Picaroon to occupy my time.

I’ve run out of my year’s supply of superlatives to describe Picaroon’s puzzles and so I’ll just say that he’s on top form here [rather gentler than usual but that’s fine for today] and hope that you enjoyed it as much as I did. There are various sporting references here, many of them concerning 8dn – and also rugby and golf –  but I’ll leave others to list them, because I’m sure to miss some. I’m happy to see my own home team mentioned at 3dn – but no mention of Tigers.

Many thanks, Picaroon, for the extra Christmas present.

Across

1 The virtuous aren’t found in police force (6)
SAINTS
AINT [aren’t] in SS [police force]

4 Pack, card player works out, lacking spades (6)
WOLVES
W [bridge player] + [s]OLVES [works out, minus s {spades}]

9 Arsenal may display these tight turns (4)
GUNS
A reversal [turns] of SNUG [tight – as in the fit of a garment]

10 Train in a ground after game in a fantastic country (10)
RURITANIAN
An anagram [ground] of TRAIN IN A after RU [game]

11 Country Britain governed that is overthrown (6)
BRUNEI
B [Britain] + RUN [governed] + a reversal [overthrown] of IE [that is]

12 New trio with Man United’s legendary menace (8)
MINOTAUR
An anagram [new] of TRIO and MAN U

13 Notice reporter half-cut before his boss retired (9)
ADJOURNED
AD [notice] + JOURN[alist] [reporter half cut] + ED [his boss]

15 Former backs and the like (2,2)
ET AL
A reversal [backs] of LATE [former]

16 Lofted ball in, after header from Chelsea (4)
CHIP
C[helsea] + HIP [in]

17 Team — this one’s left in small pieces? (9)
ELEVENTHS
ELEVEN [team] + TH[i]S [one’s left]

21 Ruler knocked back a drink with a poor player (8)
MAHARAJA
A reversal [knocked back] of A JAR [a drink] + A HAM [a poor player]

22 Ruddy track by female pop star (6)
CHERRY
CHER [female pop star] + RY [track]

24 Interpretative psychologist’s opening up Electra complex (10)
PERCEPTUAL
P[sychologist’s] + an anagram [complex] of UP ELECTRA

25 Unrestrained woman, one who’s finished losing heart (4)
GOER
GO[n]ER [one who’s finished]

26 Check on Saturday’s clothing arrangement (6)
SYSTEM
STEM [check] after S[aturda]Y

27 Solution’s to keep City back, the French learn here (6)
LYCÉES
LYES [solution] round a reversal [back] of EC [City]

 

Down

1 Kane, perhaps on the left, is encouraged (7)
SPURRED
SPUR [{Harry} Kane, perhaps] + RED [on the left]

2 Playmaker with affliction in hip (5)
IBSEN
BSE [ bovine spongiform encephalopathy – affliction] in IN [hip]

3 Row about blunder, one foxes may avoid? (7)
TERRIER
TIER [row] round ERR [blunder]

5 Looking annoyed, wanting power trip (6)
OUTING
[p]OUTING [looking annoyed] minus p [power]

6 Drink abroad and get out lots of drink for game (5-2-2)
VINGT-ET-UN
VIN [drink abroad] + an anagram [out] of GET + TUN [lots of drink]

7 Flyer nearly cheeks fool (7)
SEAGULL
SEA[t] [nearly cheeks] + GULL [fool]

8 Learner’s cracking debut fit for top clubs (7,6)
PREMIER LEAGUE
L [learner] in [cracking] PREMIÈRE [debut] + AGUE [fit]

14 The powerful old girl working with cash (9)
OLIGARCHS
O [old] + an anagram [working] of GIRL and CASH

16 County towns content to leave drinks (7)
CLARETS
CLARE [county] + T[own]S

18 Frankly, nothing stops Communist guerrillas with China (7)
VOCALLY
O [nothing] in VC [Viet Cong – Communist guerrillas] + ALLY [China – cockney rhyming slang]

19 Men score, cutting through Harlequins’ sides, or Wasps (7)
HORNETS
OR [other ranks – men] + NET [score] in H[arlequin]S

20 One hoarding shows enchanting fellow clothing Greek character (6)
MAGPIE
MAGE [enchanting fellow] round [clothing] PI [Greek character

23 English and Scots off target, mostly low score (5)
EAGLE
E [English] + AGLE[y or e] [Scots off target – which I knew from Burns’ ‘To a mouse’
“The best laid schemes o’ Mice an’ Men
Gang aft agley…”]

48 comments on “Guardian 27,701 / Picaroon”

  1. Morning all.

    Great stuff as ever from Pickers – loads of premier league nicknames (in the solutions: saints, wolves, terriers, cherries, eagles, hornets, seagulls, magpies and clarets plus Eileen’s own foxes in the clues).

    Brightened up a dull day so thanks to both.

  2. I was wondering if we were going to have a football theme, what with SAINTS and WOLVES.

    Couldn’t parse EAGLE.

    Checked the spelling of VINGT-ET-UN and, yes, you are quite correct – it does have hyphens when it’s the card game.  The French number, of course, doesn’t.

    Thanks to Picaroon and to Eileen.

  4. Thanks Picaroon and Eileen

    There may be a publication today, but the paper shop is shut! Fortunately there’s a printout.

    A DNF for me, in fact – I gave up on GOER. I didn’t parse WOLVES or SPURRED, and I’m confused by “Frankly” = VOCALLY.

    Favourite was PERCEPTUAL, for the “Electra complex”.

  5. Hi Eileen

    You have a typo in 26ac. The last pair of square brackets should be around the Y in Saturday.

    Happy boxing day

  6. … and could add indirect references in SPURRED and GUNS. Perhaps also 14d OLIGARCHS, if that is the right noun for men who have bought Premier League clubs, e.g. Abramovich at Chelsea. Classy puzzle as usual from Picaroon, brightening up a dank day in Scotland.

  7. Thanks Eileen for parsing EAGLE. Didnt know who the Terriers were-and dont know if they will stay up.

    Lovely Boxing Day fare from the great Pickers.

  10. Thanks Picaroon; good cluing to fit in all the themed material.

    Thanks Eileen; no need to know much about football to solve, with the exception of Harry Kane.

    I struggled with this a bit – thanks for the explanation of EAGLE. China is mate, so a two-step process I think to ally, which is a bit like an indirect anagram, if I have understood it correctly (?)

  12. Thanks to Picaroon and Eileen for an enjoyable puzzle.

    Despite being a first word of 9a supporter I particularly enjoyed 1dn with Harry Kane, and a different sort of playmaker sneaking in at 2dn.

    Extra thanks to you Eileen for getting the Burns quotation right in 23dn (not that I would expect anything else).

  13. Got the theme from my first two solutions, 1a and 1d. Didn’t help me much, if at all. Spotted a few after I’d parsed and entered them, but didn’t know Cherries or Terriers (if they are themed entries). No problem with parsing EAGLE though.
    Thanks Eileen and Picaroon.

  14. Thanks to Picaroon and Eileen. Very enjoyable, even though I  did not know all of the football items. Like Eileen, I knew “agley” from Burns and China-mate-ally from previous puzzles but not Harry Kane or GOER as a term. LOI was MAHARAJAH where I needed all the As before I got it.

  15. It appears to be my day for noticing themes – I’m sure it won’t last

    Thanks to Picaroon for an enjoyable crossword, the SW corner of which took longer than the rest.   Thanks also to Eileen

  16. Blue Canary didn’t mention Spurs and Reds (Liverpool and Man U) in 1d, so I reckon name-checks for 13 of 18 teams. Pretty impressive work from Picaroon.

  17. Having taken 7 years of Latin, I can’t let 15a go. ET AL. means “and the others”, not “and the like”. Sure, sometimes the “others” may be similar, but there is no requirement. For example, in technical papers, when referring to another paper the standard convention when the other work has 3 or more authors is to say e.g. “A.N. Author et al. (2018)”; there is no suggestion the other authors are anything like the first listed.

  18. Thanks to Picaroon and Eileen. When I saw it was Picaroon I thought I would be in for a battle and I was not wrong. First pass yielded little but eventually got in to the top half and even spited the theme. However halfway through had the top half in but nothing in the bottom half. The bottom half, particularly the SE, seemed to take forever with last ones being vocally, goer and eagle (could not be anything else but needed Eileen’s parsing). That said still a very enjoyable battle with lots of great clues. Thanks again to Picaroon and Eileen.

  19. Happy Christmas everyone and many thanks for the comprehensive blog Eileen.

    Enjoyed this but slightly unclear how the Harry Kane clue works. Does playing for Spurs make one a spur? Not convinced but it didn’t spoil an excellent crossword from one of my favourite setters.

    Many thanks to The Pirate.

  21. Did this first thing this morning and forgot to come back and look for the blog. A very enjoyable puzzle, with an obvious theme that took me far too long to see, perhaps a little easier than Picaroon normally is.

    Thanks to Eileen and Picaroon

  22. Didn’t get the theme until MAGPIE. Must confess I am a sucker for lost causes. After the fortnightly roars from St James Park while a student in Newcastle, I became a long-suffering fan of a team that has been also-ran ever since; there to make up the number but never a serious contender for anything.

    Thank you, Picaroon and Eileen

  23. Vocally as a synonym for frankly, and china-mate-ally, are a bit of a stretch.  Also \”in\” for \”hip\” in 16ac. \”In\” doesn\’t justify the adjectival form of Ruritania.  I agree with DrWhatson@17 about et al. And how  does perceptual equal interpretative, or adjourned equal retired?

    Pretty sloppy clueing overall.

  27. Guafrid, with all respect, “Frankly”, just being in a dictionary or thesaurus is not sufficient justification imo. These puzzles are being solved by people, not reference works. I see three occasions where being in a dictionary is itself enough: (1) in a prize puzzle, (2) where there are explicit instructions, or (3) a venue other than this one where the difficulty level is customarily very high.

  28. Thanks Eileen and Picaroon. Nice theme, but a DNF for me. Possibly my mind is still in Maskarade mode, but it would have been a long time indeed before ‘police force’ made me think “SS” or ‘card player’ made me think “W”.

  29. Thank you to Picaroon and Eileen.

    I’m not a fan (of the beautiful game; I was of this crossword), but is Claret linked to the theme and is there a team nicknamed the pirates ?

  33. Thank you Muffin. If there isn’t a team called the Pirates, there are surely plenty of candidates.

  34. The Cornish Pirates are a rugby team. I don’t know if there is a football side called “pirates” (I only know the Clarets for obvious reasons!)

  36. I’d never heard of Harry Kane (or most of the themed teams either), so the only Kane I could think of was Citizen Kane.

    I thought the County was Down, minus OWN, the content of “towns.”  That left the letter C, and then how could LARETS = drinks?  Thank you, Eileen, for putting me in the right county!

    There’s the Pittsburgh Pirates, who play baseball …

    Starting from the idea that iambic pentameter is the rhythm that English speech naturally reverts to, I make an informal collection of things that people say that fit that pattern (including me, as long as I wasn’t trying to scan at the time).  Thank you, Eileen, for an addition to my collection, “I haven’t blogged on Boxing Day before.”

     

     

  37. Am taking temporary leave from the Picaroon fan club today. Not because of the round ball/soccer + other sports theme,  but the cluing of single and double letters which were  very tired:

    W for card player.  SS for police force. And all the usuals: O for nothing. O for old.  RY for railway. OR for men. E for English. B for Britain.  P for power. And the stale old ERR for blunder and TIER for row.

    It’s often been said here that when a crossword is heavily themed, it’s at the cost of the cluing and this one seems to be another example. The ‘cleverness’ in fitting so many themed words into the grid, is obscured, for me anyway, by the unimaginative wordplays,

    As for GOER, don’t like it. Would rather it was gender neutral or maybe still sticking with the football theme. But I’m also in the non prescriptive linguistics  camp, so anything goes 🙂  I did appreciate the attempt at humour in the surface.

    I was going for F+ *REE* but couldn’t justify it.

    BTW Did anyone else try to think of 17-a-side teams for 17D?  (Team – this one). I thought Picaroon was being clever here, matching the clue with its number,  but no.  Why ELEVEN .. out of all the possibilities?

    Liked the key clue 8D, surface and wordplay. Favourite was  the Electra complex. TILT was what Eileen told me about Scots off target and Burns. Thankyou.

     

  38. Thank you Picaroon and Eileen. Really enjoyed this puzzle. Took a while to get eagle and goer. Generally a lovely puzzle although I agree with Jax@26. No other complaints at all – great fun on a relaxing boxing day.

  40. Hi Kathleen. The City of London, ie the Square Mile or Financial District has the postcode series EC (East Central) and Railway=track is abbreviated to “ry” although sneakily also to “rwy” !
    HTH

  41. Only got round to this today – I assume that Eagle and Seagull make reference to singular members of Crystal Palace and Brighton and Hove Albion!

  42. Only finished this today. I looked at it yesterday evening,realised it was football and decided not to bother but I only got today’s paper about half an hour ago so while I was waiting I had a go and surprised myself by recognising some of the nicknames. Needed reference to get the rest,or what I think is the rest. LOI was GOER – which I thought a little questionable.
    Thanks Picaroon

  43. Ok, I gather it’s RY for railway (I’m used to RR for railroad – ‘way makes more sense though…).

    EC is the postal code for City of London (I had been stuck on it meaning Man City due to the theme)

    One last question I haven’t been able to answer for myself: RU = game? Anyone?

  45. hi again Kathleen…RU= Rugby Union.

    These are all UK cryptic crossword bread-and-butter abbrs. so you’ll see them again and again. And again…

  46. Ah, great word GOER! We’re back in Monty Python country.
    The Electra complex was new to me, so thanks for the additional appreciation of the clue.

  47. Hi Kathleen, if you’re still there.  Welcome to the site! – I hope we’ll hear more from you.

    I’m sorry I wasn’t around yesterday to answer your queries. As baerchen says [thanks  to him 😉 ] , EC, RY and RU are very common in UK crosswords – so common that I didn’t think to clarify them in the blog. I’m sorry – it’s always difficult to judge how much to take for granted.

  48. Thanks for the help baerchen & the warm welcome Eileen! You will probably see me around as I encounter more of these bread-and-butter short abbr that are much more difficult to Google.

    I’m a longtime NYTimes American xword solver in Portland, Oregon, looking for a new challenge. I’ve read / watched enough British lit / pop culture that I can hobble along. I often solve with my Anglophile mum.

    I loved this puzzle in particular because I’m a footy fan (I go to my local at 7am every Saturday). I have to say I was a bit miffed that my favorite club Everton was one of the only 3 (also Cardiff, Fulham) that I could find no reference to in the answers or clues. *harumph*

    Cheers

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