Bluth has become a regular Indy setter in the last year or so, and one I always enjoy meeting.
We have a handful of references to various sports, along with Bluth’s typical quirky definitions. I liked the use of “charge” in two consecutive clues with different meanings (and another one a couple of entries later, where we just need its initial letter). My favourites were 22a (for the two different ways of indicating policemen, and because it’s just an amusing word) and 8d (it made me laugh). Last one in was 5a, which was in the “obvious when you see it” category. Thanks Bluth for the fun.
Definitions are underlined; BOLD UPPERCASE indicates letters used in the wordplay; square brackets [ ] indicate omitted letters.
| ACROSS | ||
| 1 | SCRUFF |
Initially Sadio Mane may be penetrating football club on the counter – one that looks disorganised (6)
|
| Initial letter of S[adio] + FUR (mane maybe = animal hair), inserted into (penetrating) FC (abbreviation for Football Club) reversed (on the counter). For those who aren’t into the beautiful game, Sadio Mane is a striker for Liverpool FC, and “counter” in a football context is short for “counter-attack” = attacking play immediately after regaining the ball from the opposition.
Scruff = a person of untidy (scruffy) appearance. |
||
| 5 | WATERLOO |
Took in both sides in court defeat (8)
|
| ATE (took in food) + R L (right and left = both sides), in WOO (court, as a verb = make romantic approaches to).
The battle where Napoleon was defeated; or metaphorically, as in “to meet one’s Waterloo” = a situation that proves to be someone’s downfall. |
||
| 9 | PINCE-NEZ |
Write book about corporation, gripping readers (5-3)
|
| PEN (as a verb = write) + EZ (abbreviation for the Old Testament book of Ezra), containing (about) INC (Inc. = abbreviation for Incorporated, in the name of a corporation).
19th-century spectacles without side arms over the ears, which stay in place by gripping tightly on the nose: from the French for “pinch the nose”. |
||
| 10 | SACHET |
Bag from excursion, reportedly (6)
|
| Homophone (reportedly) of SASHAY = an excursion. (I only knew sashay as a verb, meaning to walk in a showy way, but Chambers has this noun usage too.) | ||
| 11 | PROPAGANDA |
Disinformation for atheist lawyer (10)
|
| PRO (for = in favour of) + PAGAN (atheist) + DA (District Attorney = US lawyer). | ||
| 12 | GOWN |
Essentially legal, personal habit (4)
|
| Middle letter (essentially) of [le]G[al] + OWN (personal).
Habit = gown = a long loose garment. |
||
| 13 | ICEFIELD |
One will remain cool and play diamonds first (8)
|
| FIELD (play, as a verb in sports terminology: to field a team, or to play a team, is to appoint a specific set of players for a match) with ICE (slang for diamonds) first. | ||
| 16 | EXODUS |
Manage to text stud – having absolutely no time for going out (6)
|
| Anagram (manage, as a verb) of [t]O [t]EX[t] S[t]UD without all four copies of the letter T (absolutely no time).
Exodus = departure. |
||
| 17 | AMBUSH |
Half of team and coach beginning to handle attack (6)
|
| Second half of [te]AM + BUS (coach = passenger vehicle) + beginning letter of H[andle]. | ||
| 19 | STAMPEDE |
Charge impressed English (8)
|
| STAMPED (impressed, in the sense of embossed) + E (short for English). | ||
| 21 | WARD |
Charge Germany following hostility (4)
|
| D (abbreviation for Germany, from Deutschland) after WAR (hostility).
Charge = ward, as in a ward of court: someone under the guardianship of another. |
||
| 22 | DIPLODOCUS |
Old copper goes after two policemen start to suspect one hasn’t been seen in ages (10)
|
| O (old) + CU (Cu = chemical symbol for copper, from Latin cuprum), after DI (Detective Inspector = policeman) + PLOD (slang for policeman, from the character Mr Plod in books by Enid Blyton), then finally the starting letter of S[uspect].
A dinosaur, which indeed hasn’t been seen alive for ages. |
||
| 25 | CASINO |
Watchmaker acquiring new house (6)
|
| CASIO (Japanese electronics company, making digital watches among many other things), containing N (new).
The “house” in gambling terms is the casino itself: punters are betting against the house, with the odds skewed in favour of the house of course. |
||
| 26 | IRON-CLAD |
Press charges at first – boy’s very well defended? (4-4)
|
| IRON (press = to smooth clothes with a hot iron) + first letter of C[harges] + LAD (boy). | ||
| 27 | STAGE SET |
Period film’s enthralling southern scenery (5,3)
|
| STAGE (period = a specific time as part of a longer time-line) + ET (Spielberg film), containing (enthralling) S (Southern). | ||
| 28 | YORKER |
Shrek royalties somewhat reflecting delivery (6)
|
| Hidden answer (somewhat = only partly), reversed (reflected), in [sh]REK ROY[alties].
Yorker, in cricket = a ball bowled (a delivery) that lands close to the batter’s feet. |
||
| DOWN | ||
| 2 | CRIER |
One who can confidently deliver chargrilled crab regularly (5)
|
| One letter in three (regularly) from C[ha]R[gr]I[ll]E[d c]R[ab].
As in town crier = one who delivers proclamations in a loud confident voice. |
||
| 3 | UNCAP |
Take top off – paunch not completely shaking (5)
|
| Anagram (shaking) of PAUNC[h] without the last letter (not completely). | ||
| 4 | FINAGLE |
Cheat put on record over hack (7)
|
| FILE (to store in a filing system = put on record), containing (over) NAG (hack = a horse, but generally not a very good one).
Finagle = cheat, as a verb = to achieve something by trickery. |
||
| 5 | WIZENED |
Moisture rising outside – one having calm frame of mind dried up (7)
|
| DEW (moisture), reversed (rising = upwards in a down clue), containing I (one in Roman numerals) + ZEN (as an adjective = having a calm frame of mind, from Zen Buddhism and its emphasis on meditation). | ||
| 6 | TO SCALE |
Opera on banks of Loire is in proportion (2,5)
|
| TOSCA (opera by Puccini) + outer letters (banks) of L[oir]E. | ||
| 7 | ROCK GROUP |
Diamond ring for Queen, say (4,5)
|
| ROCK (slang for diamond, similar to ICE in 13a) + GROUP (ring = a group of people, especially a gang involved in illegal activity).
Definition by example: the group Queen, led by the late Freddie Mercury. |
||
| 8 | OVERWOUND |
Where bandage ought to be too tight (9)
|
| Cryptic definition: a bandage is used OVER a WOUND. | ||
| 14 | COMBATANT |
Warrior and superhero raising millions during short function (9)
|
| BATMAN (a superhero), moving the M (millions) to the start (raising it, in a down clue), inserted into (during) COT (short for cotangent = a mathematical function). | ||
| 15 | FOUNDLING |
Orphan‘s fund log-in hacked (9)
|
| Anagram (hacked) of FUND LOG-IN.
Foundling = a child found after being abandoned by its parents. Not necessarily an orphan (one with no parents at all), but it’s close enough for crosswords. |
||
| 18 | HIDEOUS |
Refuge mostly small and ugly (7)
|
| HIDEOU[t] (refuge), without the last letter (mostly), then S (small). | ||
| 19 | SOPHIST |
Entertained by Aesop – historically one who’ll split hairs? (7)
|
| Hidden answer (entertained by) in [ae]SOP HIST[orically].
Someone who splits hairs = argues, cleverly but perhaps not correctly, over small details. |
||
| 20 | APOLOGY |
A sport having good, variable defence (7)
|
| A + POLO (a sport) + G (short for good) + Y (symbol for a mathematical variable).
Apology = a written defence of a specific idea or belief; also called “apologia” when used in this sense. |
||
| 23 | OCCUR |
Our inspiring County Council take place (5)
|
| OUR containing (inspiring = breathing in?) CC (abbreviation for County Council). | ||
| 24 | USAGE |
Convention recalled European Union limiting fuel supplies (5)
|
| EU (European Union), containing (limiting) GAS (fuel supplies), all reversed (recalled).
Usage = convention = the way things are generally done. |
Great start to Thursday morning! Couldn’t parse finagle until visiting this page. Favourites, DIPLODOCUS and PROPAGANDA.Thanks Bluth and Quirister
Another great crossword from Bluth – thanks to him and Quirister
So pleased to get COMBATANT which led to getting WARD & CASINO as my last two and completed without any cheats. Before anyone complains, I realise that one person’s ‘cheat’ is another’s valid solving tool. For me, word fits and anagram solvers (and reveals of course) are ‘cheats’.
Very enjoyable. Once again it was good to see that Bluth’s seemingly obligatory verbose clue was justified by a relevant surface.
FINAGLE was a new word for me, but fairly clued, and PROPAGANDA was my favourite.
Many thanks to Bluth and to Quirister.
Thanks Quirister for justifying SACHET (my knowledge as yours), fully parsing PINCE-NEZ (EZ is the most obscure things I have seen in a daily crossword for a while!) and WATERLOO, and explaining what happended to BATMAN as I could see him in there scrambled up, but didn’t twig the exact manipulation.
I had Ring for GROUP in the mathematical sense but yours is better as mine would strictly need a defn by example indicator for that part as well as the overall definition, I think.
Great crossword, using CASIO was a pretty neat idea and DIPLODOCUS a belter, thanks Bluth.
The usual entertaining Bluth challenge. I learnt a new word in FINAGLE and liked the ‘gripping readers’ def for PINCE-NEZ, the wordplay for DIPLODOCUS and my last in, the original crossword sense for ‘house’ in CASINO.
Thanks to Bluth and Quirister
A very nice puzzle. Ez for Ezra was a step too far for this atheist. I think pagans believe in some Gods but I still liked the clue. I tried every brand of watch under the sun before landing on Casio.
Petert @7. I think that all atheists are pagans, but not all pagans are atheists.
RD @ 8: I’m not sure I agree. I thought atheists were ‘no god’ (a-theist), but that pagans were polytheists, not monotheists.
Simon S @9. According to Collins online, there are two definitions of pagan:
1. a member of a group professing a polytheistic religion or any religion other than Christianity, Judaism, or Islam
2. a person without any religion; heathen
From this, it would appear that a pagan can be either someone who follows a non-mainstream religion or an atheist. Chambers confirms this, adding that the second of these meanings is “more recent”.
RD @ 10
Hmmm, those two definitions seem contradictory (1 with a religion, 2 with no religion. And per Chambers, ‘heathen’ from Collins def 2 is the same as Chambers def 1.
My, how these dictionaries (don’t) conspire to confuse us
Thanks for the blog, Quirister and for the comments.
My intended parsing of 24d was slightly different to that here, not that it matters either way. I intended the word ‘supplies’ to be a sort of link word, albeit one that doesn’t need to sit between the definition and the wordplay. Definition, this wordplay supplies/delivers/provides etc. Cheers!
That’s it then, Bluth.
It was one my (only a) few questions marks.
24ac makes totally sense now and I think it’s better than Quirister’s explanation in the blog, although that was also how I looked at it.
As someone who sets puzzles himself, one should always be careful in giving an opinion.
Being an avid solver, I found previous Bluth crosswords at times a bit ‘over-constructed’, as if things were cobbled together to fit the cryptic element into a proper surface.
None of that here!
The NW was a place I had to revisit, with the missing FINAGLE, WIZENED and ‘field’ = ‘play’ causing gaps.
After finding 5dn, the Z at the end of PINCE-NEZ (9ac) ultimately gave the game away.
A nice clue with a nice definition – I was more or less sure that EZ referred to a Bible book but there it stopped.
A bit naughty to equate INC to ‘corporation’ but I can have it, or better, stomach it … (sorry, bad pun).
Naughtier though is 1ac.
The footballer is Sadio Mané (with an accent) and we’ll have to use Mane (without one).
But a really fine crossword which I thoroughly enjoyed solving.
The ‘time’ device is 16ac is just lovely, a particular highlight for me!
Many thanks to Quirister & Bluth.
You’re right that Sadie Mané’s name should have an accent – but, in many newspapers, including The Independent, the accent is routinely ignored – in headlines and in the main text:
https://www.independent.co.uk/sport/football/liverpool-arsenal-result-final-score-goals-b1961458.html
If it’s good enough for the Independent’s sports pages, I figure it ought to be ok for its crossword too – my clue is simply observing the house style!
When I said that it was a bit naughty, I didn’t mean to say that you can’t do it.
I am totally OK with it, no criticism but I was slightly surprised no-one above mentioned it.
Thanks Sil. I didn’t think you were suggesting it wasn’t okay to do it – I just wanted to explain that it was something I considered and justified before submitting.