A few references to the recent election campaign were included in this grid. The groan-worthy “Strong and stable” will surely be remembered for decades. It is really astonishing how much untruth Lynton Crosby can convey in 3 words. I wonder if Cyclops could sense the way the wind was blowing when setting?
As for solving, I thought I was off to a flier on solving 1 down RANSOM at first glance delivering a decent clutch of first letters but 13/6 remained unsolved till the end.
First pass only 10 answers entered with bottom left quadrant devoid. So I must rate this as at the harder end of the scale for Eye puzzles, but as usual when reviewing the wordplay and constructing the blog everything is very clear and fair. So I suspect this time I might have been have an off day. Either way the puzzle cheered me up.
Some lovely surface readings in the clues this time too.
| Across | ||
|---|---|---|
| 7 | INNER CHILD | Boozer Eric held off, energy gone, showing capacity to act immaturely (5,5) INN (boozer) (ERIC HELD – E[nergy)* AInd: off |
| 11 | STIRRUP | Put your foot in it, snapping “Trump no moderate leader, sir!” (7) (TRU[m]P SIR)* AInd: snapping. |
| 12 | LONG LEG | Cricketer‘s desire to go on stage (4,3) LONG (desire) LEG (stage) |
| 13/6 | MILES AWAY | Dreaming of emails hacked with style (5,4) EMAILS* AInd: hacked, WAY (style). Last one in. And of course now I wonder why. Lovely clue, great surface |
| 14 | TALKED OUT | Defeated Bill – was the Speaker absent? (6,3) TALKED (was the speaker) OUT (absent) |
| 15 | RESIDUE | ‘Remains‘ rise in revolt, right? (7) RISE* AInd: in revolt, DUE (right) |
| 16 | COVER-UP | Finished stuffing part of bra front (5-2) OVER (finished ) inside (stuffing) CUP (part of bra) |
| 18/21 | STRONG AND STABLE | Election slogan; “After numerous sand shifts, put forward legislation” (6,3,6) STRONG (numerous) SAND* AInd: shifts, TABLE (put forward legislation) |
| 20 | TAPAS | Bug-like snacks (5) TAP (bug) AS (like) |
| 22 | CASHIER | “Sack of lolly put before one” – Brenda (7) CASH (lolly) I (one) ER (Brenda) |
| 23 | CORTINA | Jeremy’s left wing sadly ain’t providing transport (7) COR[byn], AIN’T* AInd: sadly |
| 24 | ROYAL JELLY | William, say, explosive sustainer of queen to be (5,5) ROYAL (William, say) JELLY (explosive, gelignite) |
| Down | ||
| 1 | RANSOM | Managed to have a few almost – a price to be paid (6) RAN (Managed) SOM[e] (a few, almost) |
| 2 | BACILLUS | Bug campaign transport carrying Bill? Wicked! (8) AC (Bill) ILL (wicked) inside BUS (campaign transport) |
| 3 | SNAP | Like May’s appeal to voters; “I can match that!” (4) Refers to the recent ill-fated “SNAP” election called by the now totally discredited Teresa M. Will she still be PM by the time you read this? |
| 4 | WELL PLACED | Being in a good position, the Eye is going to stand on Donald’s head (4-6) WE’LL (the Eye is going to) PLACE (stand) D[onald] |
| 5 | ODD GET-UP | Crooked dodge by Trump (not Mr)– bizarre habit (3,3-2) (DODGE)* AInd: crooked, then T[r]U[m]P |
| 8 | CONSERVATORY | House annex raves about to break two May supporters? (12) (RAVES)* AInd: about, inside CON and TORY |
| 9 | IGLOO | Block housing – one grand crap place (5) I G[rand] LOO |
| 10 | PRESIDENTIAL | Hardly descriptive of Donald’s feverishly inspired tale (12) (INSPIRED TALE)* AInd: feverishly |
| 14 | THE FAIR SEX | Article: ‘Just southern, old, patronised women’ (3,4,3) THE (article) FAIR (just) S[outhern] EX (old) |
| 15 | REST CURE | Sleep with arsehole at end of the convalescence (4,4) REST (sleep) CUR (arsehole) [th]E |
| 17 | REPRISAL | President, right, is into “factual” vengeance (8) P[resident] R[ight] IS, all inside REAL (factual) |
| 19 | RUSTY | Having big tits, needs different top (out of practice) (5) BUSTY B/R |
| 23/25 | COLD CALL | Conservative getting on with Corbyn at first – everything that you’d rather not be on the end of? (4,4) C[onservative] OLD (getting on) C[orbyn] ALL (everything) |
I was trying to work up a joke referring to the answer to 18/21 along the lines of Jeremy Deller’s response
But I’m no good at inventing original humour, so fall back to nicking a gem from the wonderful Moose Allain.
I trust he won’t mind if I also plug his brilliant book at Unbound here
his website here
and his twitter feed here 
Thanks beermagnet – although I had (20a) to be TAPAS, I had bug in the sense of insect firmly planted in my mind (unfortunate metaphor) and didn’t see the wire tapping sense until reading your solution. 13/6 was also a late one in for me.
I thought that this was extremely tough to get started. Indeed, it took me a day to get the first one in. Then, slowly but surely they all dropped into place. Bacillus last for me with cashier a close second last!!!! Not hugely convinced by strong = numerous. Or is it somehow related to a strong majority? Or a strong body of men?
Winsor @2 I also struggled with this crossword. I think you are right that strong is in the sense of when we refer to a group and may say something like the crowd was 200 strong and also a strong majority. I use the Chambers Crossword Dictionary after recommendation by jetdoc on this site and it helps me no end. There is a reference to numerous under strong in Chambers
Completely missed the cashier/sack connection. Got the clue by thinking ‘Well, you’d put a sack of lolly in front of one’.
Ho hum…