Financial Times 18,152 by GURNEY

by

Gurney is today's FT setter.

An enjoyable solve that was over too quickly. Nothing terribly obscure in terms of solutions or general knowledge, with my LOI being PLENITUDE.

Thanks, Gurney.

ACROSS
1 UPSTAIRS
Mentally elevated by street tunes? (8)

UP ("elevated") by St. (street) + AIRS ("tunes")
5 BALLAD
Song essential for soccer promotion (6)

BALL (something that is "essential for soccer") + AD ("promotion")
10 UNFIT
Out of condition squad carrying flab originally (5)

UNIT ("squad") carrying F(lab) [initally]
11 SHOW TRIAL
Type of business test that has political motive? (4,5)

SHOW (business) + TRIAL ("test")
12 EXPERTISE
Know-how of former priest, turbulent, ultimately invaluable (9)

EX ("former") + *(priest) [anag:turbulent] + [ultimately] (invaluabl)E
13 RIGHT
Proper entitlement (5)

Double definition
14 ADHERE
First-class diamonds in this place — stay attached (6)

A ("first class") + D (diamonds) + HERE ("in this place")
15 TRIPPER
One making effort to accommodate very quiet visitor (7)

TRIER ("one making effort") to accommodate PP (pianissimo in music notation, so "very quiet")
18 ILLEGAL
Banned, one’s going to Edinburgh at the outset with female (young) (7)

I'LL ("one's going to") + E(dinburgh) [at the outset] with GAL ("young female")
20 CLARET
Irish county, best in the end for drink (6)

CLARE ("Irish county") + (bes)T [at the end]
22 CABIN
There’s room in taxi home (5)

CAB ("taxi") + IN ("home")
24 TANGERINE
Fruit scent by lake around noon (9)

TANG ("scent") by (Lake) ERIE around N (noon)
25 INTERVENE
Step in, stupidly reinvent wheel essentially? (9)

*(reinvent e) [anag:stupidly] where E is (wh)E(el) [essentially]
26 COURT
Place for trying attempt to attract? (5)

Double definition
27 FINALE
Ending excellent, a learner’s impressed (6)

A + L (learner) impressed into FINE ("excellent")
28 LEAP YEAR
Spring indeed rainy at start — a one in four occurrence (4,4)

LEAP ("spring") + YEA ("indeed") + R(ainy) [at start]
DOWN
1 UNUSED
New global body — America extremely doubtful initially (6)

UN (United Nations, a "global body") + US ("America") + E(xtremely) D(oubtful) [initially]
2 SOFT-PEDAL
Play down unhappy date flops (4-5)

*(date flops) [anag:unhappy]
3 ATTORNEY GENERAL
Note agent rarely gets upset when Government looks for their advice? (8,7)

*(note agent rarely) [anag:gets upset]
4 RESPITE
Undeterred by having leader changed, pause from exertion (7)

(d)ESPITE ("undeterred") having (its) leader changed becomes (R)ESPITE
6 A STORM IN A TEACUP
Row about leaves? It may soon be over (1,5,2,1,6)

Cryptic definition, the leaves in the clue referring to tea leaves.
7 LYING
Prone to become deceitful (5)

Double definition
8 DILATORY
I’d given up on US city politician, lazy (8)

<= I'D [given up] on LA (Los Angeles, so "US city") + TORY ("politician")
9 HONEST
Genuine with one’s thanks? A bit (6)

A bit of "witH ONE'S Thanks"
16 PLENITUDE
New line-up with three English defenders at first — it won’t fall short? (9)

*(line up ted) [anag:new] where TED is T(hree) E(nglish) D(efenders) [at first]
17 MISCHIEF
Briefly regret the absence of boss’s devilment? (8)

[briefly] MIS(s) ("regret the absence of") + CHIEF ("boss")
19 LATHER
Parting with nothing, one hating excitement (6)

L(o)ATHER ("one hating") parting with O (nothing)
20 CONCEDE
Acknowledge argument against church journalist brought up (7)

CON ("argument against") + CE ("Church" of England) + <=Ed. (editor, so "journalist", brought up)
21 MENTOR
One advising commitment ordinarily lacking to some extent (6)

Hidden in [lacking to some extent] "commitMENT ORdinarliy"
23 BATON
Silly to ban weapon (5)

*(to ban) [anag:silly]

15 comments on “Financial Times 18,152 by GURNEY”

  1. “Lazy” isn’t one of the synonyms of DILATORY listed in Collins, but I guess it’s close enough. I couldn’t parse ILLEGAL as I didn’t think to put an apostrophe in ILL.

    An easy one today, I thought. Those who believe in the myth that puzzles should become more challenging over each week no doubt would consider this to be Monday fare.

    Good fun.

  2. Agree GDU; it’s only a bit of a nudge from “slow” or “unhurried” to “lazy”. And yes, a gentle one for Thursday, ta Gurney and loona.

  3. I would also say not too challenging, but I never quite felt on the setter’s wavelength and finished with a couple unparsed. Thanks for the clear steers loonapick

    My favourites were CABIN, BATON, and CLARET.

    TANGERINE – I have a similar whinge to yesterday: “lake” yielding ERIE is unfair given how many four-letter lakes exist in the world.

    Thanks Gurney and loonapick

  4. Liked it, but no “aha” moments in a very fair test nevertheless. That’s two in a row in under 40m without cheating! Either I’m getting better or the ft crossword editor is atoning for last week’s horrors.

  5. I was going to say that I don’t think ‘dilatory’ means ‘lazy’ but others have beaten me to it. A very minor comment: in 4d ‘despite’ equates to ‘undeterred by’.

  6. Tried to do FT, for a change, printing it out on paper. Good fun! No checks etc.

    Didn’t see SHOW TRIAL (put in TRIAL and tried shop? SWOT? and gave up, it being the last one remaining. Oh well…) Overall though, it didn’t seem difficult. Liked A STORM IN A TEACUP and LEAP YEAR. Didn’t know DILATORY and didn’t immediately equate UPSTAIRS to “mentally” but thought it might mean that. Thanks Gurney and loonapick!

  7. Thanks Gurney and loonapick. I took the printout with me to solve on a train journey, but forgot to take a pen, so I am glad it did not too long to complete once I had got back home.

    1ac: Collins 2023 p 2186 has upstairs 3 informal in the mind: a little weak upstairs.

    4dn: I agree with Hovis@5 that “despite” should be taken as “undeterred by”..

    6dn: Another minor point here: I think this is a two part clue, alluding first to the literal meaning of the phrase and then to the normal figurative meaning, so I would break the underlining after the question mark.

  8. Thanks Gurney. I didn’t find this as easy as others; I was unable to solve SHOW TRIAL, HONEST, & LATHER but the rest seemed straightforward with my favourites being UPSTAIRS, BALLAD, CLARET, INTERVENE, LEAP YEAR, and UNUSED. Thanks loonapick for the blog.

  9. We fairly rattled through this, in contrast to yesterday. LOI was MENTOR simply because it had to be that and we failed to spot it was a hidden. Favourites were CLARET and LEAP YEAR. As for DILATORY, Chambers Compact Thesaurus gives lazy as one of its synonyms (but not vice-versa).
    Thanks, Gurney and loonapick.

  10. Martyn @3: Whenever I see ‘lake’ in a clue I either think of the letter L or Erie. The combo of letters in Erie is common in many words so keeping it in mind is useful. Besides Erie is part of the Great Lakes which hold 20% of the world’s fresh water so it’s not exactly an obscure 4-letter lake.

  11. I too found this slightly more challenging than some did. I needed every crossing letter for SHOW TRIAL, and nearly every one for A STORM IN A TEACUP. It doesn’t help that I know the phrase as “a tempest in a teapot”; I guess that’s the American version?

    And yep, ERIE is crosswordland’s favorite lake, by far, so just get used to the fact that “lake” = ERIE whenever it isn’t L. Sort of like the way “singer” is nearly always CHER (or else some songbird).

    [Fun fact: Lake Erie is, by a good distance, the shallowest of the five Great Lakes, so–despite also being the southernmost–it’s the one that gets the most ice cover (by percentage of its area) when it gets cold enough for that.]

  13. Agree with Martyn @3. I too was not on the setter’s wavelength so found today very difficult. Did not finish even half of it, (though my excuse today is pressure of time).

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