Financial Times 17,090 by LEONIDAS

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Medium easy, maximum fun.

Enjoyed this a lot. Not too stretching but with plenty of ‘yups’, which is sort of the test of a good ‘un.

Thanks, Leonidas.

picture of the completed grid

ACROSS
1 CANDIDATE
Frank with one extremely third-rate applicant (9)

CANDID (‘frank’) + A (‘one’) + 1st & last of ’Third ratE’.
6 GUSTO
Patron essentially avoided duck relish (5)

GUeSt (without centre) (= ‘patron’ of an hotel &c) + 0.
9 NOVAS
Southern river reflected bright stars (5)

S + AVON, all reversed.
10 MADELEINE
Nuts a German added to the Spanish cake (9)

MAD + EL (Sp. ‘The’) + EINE (Ger. f. ‘The’). Ah, memories.
11 HIGHCHAIRS
Seating over-excited children in front of broadcasts (10)

HIGH (‘over-excited’) + CH[ildren] + AIRS (‘broadcasts’).
12 STUD
Stable half of those in university (4)

Half of ‘STUDents’.
14 MATURED
Aged couple crossing ancient city with daughter (7)

MATE (to ‘couple’) + UR (of the Chaldaes) + D[aughter].
15 EROTICA
Tense in midst of symphony’s rousing passages (7)

T[ense] in ERO.ICA (Beethoven symphony).
17 GAROTTE
Wire newspaper about occupier of bank briefly (7)

Reversal of RAG (‘newspaper’) + OTTEr (riverbank-dweller), shortened.
19 BITCOIN
Part company with fashionable currency (7)

BIT (‘part’) + CO[mpany] + IN (‘fashionable’).
20 PONG
Aroma on unwrapping cake (4)

sPONGe.
22 MISSIONARY
Hebridean hottie maybe starts to ravish young preacher (10)

MISS IONA (possible Hebridean beauty-queen) + firsts of ‘Ravish Young’.
25 OVERWHELM
Beat whoever spoiled edges of linoleum (9)

Anagram (‘spoiled’) of WHOEVER + 1st & last of ‘LinoleuM’’.
26 TRICK
Joke with head of ticketing prior to Hay? (5)

1st of ‘Ticketing’ + RICK (some ‘hay’).
27 EGYPT
Pain being trapped in an alien country (5)

ET (‘alien’) contains GYP (informal, ‘pain’).
28 TENEMENTS
Rules protecting fellows in accommodation (9)

MEN (‘fellows’) in TENE.TS (‘rules’).
DOWN
1 CONCH
Gull scooped out crayfish shell (5)

CON (to ‘gull’) + CH (gutted ‘CrayfisH’).
2 NAVIGATOR
Sailor perhaps recalled terrible person atop reptile (9)

IVAN (‘The Terrible’, reversed) + [ali]GATOR, reptile.
3 INSECURITY
Lack of confidence in cuisine? Try cocktail (10)

Anagram (‘cocktail’) of ‘CUISINE TRY’.
4 ARMBAND
Item for pool room covered by amateur group (7)

R[oo]M in A[mateur] BAND (‘group’)
5 ENDORSE
Back last runner in the Derby as ‘arry says (7)

END (‘last’) + hORSE (dropping ‘H’), Derby runner.
6 GULP
Wolf and seal heading northwards (4)

PLUG (‘seal’), reversed upward.
7 SKINT
8 presumably from family in centre of bust-up (5)

KIN (‘family’) in centre of ‘buSTup’, with 8d (‘overdrawn’) as definition.
8 OVERDRAWN
Sketched too much without any green (9)

‘Sketched too much’ might be ‘overdrawn’, i.e. lacking money, the ‘green’ stuff.
13 POST MORTEM
Pale Monsieur on subway returning for final examination? (4,6)

POST (a stake of wood, ‘pale’) + M[onsieur] + reversal of METRO.
14 MEGAPHONE
It might hail intermittently in March (9)

Cryptic def. of that which leads the crowd on a protest ‘march’ (‘What do we want…?’ &c).
16 ISOLATION
One organising Nato’s oil withdrawal (9)

1 + anagram (‘organisation’) of ‘NATOS OIL’.
18 EVIDENT
Clear identification to enter competition (7)

ID in EV.ENT.
19 BUSHMAN
Tracker possibly in base of coach hidden by driver (7)

Last of ‘coacH’ in BUS-MAN.
21 NEEDY
Very poor bridging Clyde engineers erected (5)

Hidden, reversed, in ‘clYDE ENgineers’.
23 YOKES
Sure to lock up fine harnesses (5)

OK in YES.
24 SWOT
Academic pairs swapping sides (4)

TWOS, ends switched.

13 comments on “Financial Times 17,090 by LEONIDAS”

  1. Super puzzle as per usual from Leonidas. No 18 in case anyone wants to know. No external aids required which is quite unusual for me.

  2. Very enjoyable, Goldilocks level of difficulty. One minor error above, “eine” is German for “a”, not “the”.

  5. Absent the “Y”, I would never have got EGYPT because GYP + PAIN is new to me. Also having entered unparsed PESTO for “relish” I was stuck for GULP . Thanks GB and Leonidas

  6. Thanks for the blog, so many super clues it seems unfair to single any out. I will just crown MISS IONA as the winner.

  7. As NNI said, ‘super puzzle’.

    My ticks were for MADELEINE, EROTICA, MISSIONARY, and POST MORTEM but there wasn’t a dud clue to be seen.

    Many thanks, both.

  8. Very enjoyable diversion so thanks to Leonidas.
    The parsing of 22A doesn’t feel quite right but clearly the correct answer.

  10. Thanks Leonidis and Grant
    Actually found this one rather tough and ended up with my MADELAINE not being correct nor parsed satisfactorily. Still, as others have said, a great puzzle with excellent clues throughout. Knew that there was something happening with TWOS to get SWOT, but there was a block to see how to get to it – obviously needed to take a break and think about it a bit more.
    First in was GUSTO and eventually worked my way around to the SW corner with the clever cd MEGAPHONE, GAROTTE and PONG the last few in.

  11. ‘Without any green’ = overdrawn is just a rubbish clue.
    Gull = con isn’t great either, and who says that ‘essentially’ can mean ‘remove the middle letter’?
    Not a good crossword.

  12. To BernieS:
    ‘Green’ is pretty common for ‘money’, especially in the US, where all their currency is that colour.
    The only definition for the verb ‘to gull’ in Chambers (our Bible) is, and I quote, ‘to dupe, deceive, cheat, hoax’
    ‘Essentially avoided’ means that the heart of the word ‘GUeSt’ is removed.
    None of these gave me a second’s pause.

  13. I agree that GULL and GUeST are perfectly fine. I did have the slightest quibble with OVERDRAWN , green=money is fine and connects with the sketch idea but “without any green ” means broke or skint not really overdrawn.
    Lemski@8 I think 22Ac is alluding to the Miss England, Miss World etc contests of the past. Miss Iona would be an island beauty.

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