Independent 11,067 by Tyrus (Saturday Puzzle 2 April 2022)

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Looking back through the lists, it seems I have been blogging Tyrus Saturday Indy (prize) puzzles since November 2012 – an innocent, carefree, pre-Brexit/pre-Covid lifetime ago! – and I think this is the 15th such. Always a pleasure to shake hands with an old face…

It seems Tyrus is a bit grumpy with the Men in Black this week – no, not Will ‘the rock-smacker’ Smith and Tommy Lee Jones, but football referees – maybe his favourite football team were on the wrong end of some bad decisions recently?

The central component of this theme-ette is the ‘WHISTLER’ at 12A, which substitutes for ‘referee’ in several cross-referencing clues. We are straight in there with 1A, where the ‘ref’ is described as ‘f—– hopeless’, although the solution is not football-official related.

We then have an ‘easily influenced’ HOMER referee at 6A; STOPPAGE TIME at 18/14A; the referee needing to go to SpecSavers for some GLASSES at 25A; a LINE(S)MAN at 24A; VAR contributing to RAV-E at 17A. And (maybe) a reference to Rafa Benitez (rather than Nadal) at 11A – so maybe Tyrus is an Everton fan?… If so, that might explain the inclusion of DESPAIR at 5D?!

I enjoyed the further use of Homer for the ‘D’oh’ in HOODIE, as well as the ‘winger’ in 1A/1D for a ‘FEATHERED FRIEND’.

All good fun – and hopefully not too off-putting for non-footie fans(?). There was plenty of non-themed material as well – all nicely clued. ‘Could be us’ at 22A for PERSONAL PRONOUN got a mention in dispatches in my solving notes:

My LOIs were HOODIE and MUTINYING, and I had to look up HAVERINGS (to confirm its meaning) and FORMBY (to check it is indeed a ‘NW town’).

Many thanks to Tyrus for yet another enjoyable mental joust – I hope all is clear below.

Clue No Solution Clue (definition underlined) /

Logic/parsing
1A FEATHERED (FRIEND) & 1D Winger disheartened dropping point – ref f—– hopeless (9,6) /

anag, i.e. hopeless, of DI(S)HEARTENED (dropping S – compass point) + REF F

[the ‘winger’ being something that has/uses wings!]
6A HOMER As easily influenced 12 might be, a poet (5) /

double defn. a HOMER 12 (whistler, referee) is said to be easily influenced by a home crowd; and HOMER was a Greek poet
9A INEXACT One then catching a cold – rough! (7) /

I (one) + NEX_T (then) around (catching) A + C (cold)
10A SHORTEN Kind nurse dressing Henry’s cut (7) /

S_ORT (kind) around (dressing) H (Henry) + EN (Enrolled Nurse)
11A NOT AS FAR AS I KNOW Soaks in town getting drunk with Rafa? Don’t think so (3,2,3,2,1,4) /

anag, i.e. getting drunk, of SOAKS IN TOWN + RAFA
12A WHISTLER Game on 4th of June between both sides in North American resort (8) /

WHIST (card game) + L_R (left and right, both sides) around E (fourth letter of junE)

[Whistler is a North American skiing resort; a ‘whistler’ can also be a sporting referee – cf. several other solutions]
14A TIME See 18 (8) /

see 18A
17A RAVE Get very angry with flipping 12’s helper by end of game (4) /

RAV (VAR, video assistant referee, 12’s helper) + E (end of gamE)
18A STOPPAGE (TIME) & 14 Second-best side having issue over what 12 determines (8,4) /

S (second) + TOP (best) + PAGE (side, of a leaf of a book) + TIME (emit, or issue, over)
22A PERSONAL PRONOUN Private joke about working men recalled – could be us (8,7) /

PERSONAL (private) + P_UN (joke) around RONO (ON, working, plus OR, Other Ranks, the ‘men’ as opposed to the gentlemen officers?, recalled)
24A LINEMAN Former name of assistant to 12 – not South American sportsman (7) /

LINE(S)MAN (now usually called assistant referee), losing S (not South) = LINEMAN (player in American football)
25A GLASSES Talks a lot about latitude traditionally needed by 12? (7) /

G_ASSES (talks a lot) around L (latitude)
26A DISHY Inspector not very outgoing but attractive (5) /

DI (Detective Inspector) + SHY (not very outgoing)
27A RESPECTED Admired muscle in relaxed surroundings (9) /

RES_TED (relaxed) around (surrounding) PEC (pectoral muscle)
Down
Clue No Solution Clue (definition underlined) /

Logic/parsing
1D FRIEND See 1 Across (9) /

see 1A
2D AGENT Times featuring new instrument (5) /

AGE + T (two variations of ‘time’) around (featuring) N (new)
3D HOARSEST Are hosts cultured or extremely rough? (8) /

anag, i.e. cultured, of ARE HOSTS
4D RAT-TAIL Long hair at trial tidied up (3-4) /

anag, i.e. tidied up, of AT TRIAL
5D DESPAIR Charlatan out of uniform gets upset – look, give up! (7) /

DESP (PSE(U)D, or charlatan, without U – uniform – and upset, reversed) + AIR (look)
6D HOODIE What 6A often says about taking over – that is a potential troublemaker? (6) /

H_OD (DOH!, what 6a – Homer, of the Simpson variety – often says, about) around (taking) O (over, cricket), plus IE (id est, that is)
7D MUTINYING Rising up in China university of little consequence (9) /

M_ING (porcelain china) around U (university) + TINY (of little consequence)
8D RENOWNED On at the moment, hooligan’s getting famous (8) /

RE (on, regarding) + NOW (at the moment) + NED (hooligan)
13D HAVERINGS Own items of jewellery – that’s foolish talk (9) /

HAVE (own) + RINGS (jewellery)
15D GRAPPLED Fought closely with good pupil once in street (8) /

G (good) + R_D (road, or street) around APPLE (pupil, the ‘apple of the eye’, literally, as opposed to meaning someone one holds dear)
16D UP-TO-DATE Contemporary doing drugs originally put away (2-2-4) /

UP TO (doing) + D (Drugs, initially) + ATE (put away)
18D SPANNER Odds on royal princess opening bridge (7) /

SP (starting price, gambling odds) + R (royal), around (opened by?) ANNE (Princess Anne)
19D OPPUGNS Questions the validity of licence for popguns (7) /

anag, i.e. licence for, POPGUNS
20D FORMBY Found close to NW town (6) /

FORM (found, initiate) + BY (close to)
21D UNUSED New sides unusually showing up (6) /

reversed hidden word, i.e. ‘showing’ and ‘up’, in ‘siDES UNUsually’
23D ONSET Start at least six games without an egghead (5) /

at least six games (of e.g. tennis) would be ON(E) SET, and removing the first E (the head, or first letter, of Egg) leaves ONSET

13 comments on “Independent 11,067 by Tyrus (Saturday Puzzle 2 April 2022)”

  1. Tough, but very enjoyable, with some excellent clues. Very satisfying to solve, despite my having zero interest in football.

    Thanks Tyrus amd mc_r

  2. That was a slog, like battling hard to scrape a 1-0 win, but satisfying. GLASSES helped me to focus on getting 12, after which several related answers fell into place. Then, appropriately, I spent much of the last few minutes of the game by the (NE) corner flag. I echoed Homer’s expletive on finally getting HOODIE.
    Strange how, in an otherwise tricky puzzle, the occasional easy answer (like SHORTEN) can catch me out, as I’ve got into the habit of looking for something more complex. Thanks, Tyrus.

  3. I’m with Simon S – in every respect!

    I was caught out by the football references in HOMER and LINEMAN – didn’t know the American bit.

    My ticks were for FEATHERED FRIEND, INEXACT, WHISTLER, DISHY, DESPAIR, UP-TO-DATE and OPPUGNS – and there could have been more.

    Many thanks to Tyrus and mc_rapper67.

  4. Challenging as usual from Tyrus. I’m no great football fan, but didn’t mind the theme. My lack of knowledge on referee associated matters meant I didn’t know what was going on with HOMER or RAVE and I missed the parsing of GRAPPLED (didn’t think of “APPLE of the eye”) and UP-TO-DATE.

    Favourites were FEATHERED FRIEND and my last in HOODIE.

    Thanks to Tyrus and mc_rapper67

  5. Crikey, that was tough. I’m no fan of the round ball game but that didn’t detract in the slightest from the pleasure (mostly) gained from today’s puzzle. Ingenious use of WHISTLER – thank Goodness his mother didn’t turn up too. A couple of them would have left me roundly defeated. As it was, I did not get MUTINYING or SHORTEN so will retire to lick my wounds. Pausing only to note my own admiration for FEATHERED FRIENDS: how nice to see that crossword favourite, ‘disheartened’, used as fodder rather than instruction for once.

    Thanks Tyrus and the very busy mc_rapper

  6. Tough but fair. Needed “help” with grappled and had never come across oppugns before. Enjoyed the football stuff though not a fan. It gave an extra challenge. Thanks to both.

  7. Found this very very hard to get started. Got a few and ground to another halt then a momentary thought flashed of referees and things dropped. I guess the football and sport hating in general solvers will loathe this. Cheers Jim and MCR for that tough as old boots but very enjoyable to get it out.

  8. Like PostMark, I was expecting Whistler’s mother to turn up. I spent too long trying to connect the second best side to the offside and needed nore help than I would have liked, but a great puzzle and blog. Thanks.

  9. Thanks to Tyrus and mc_rapper67.

    Deeply impenetrable, if that’s not an oxymoron – I certainly ended up feeling like a stupid bovine. Deep respect for those who can take ‘charlatan’, find ‘pseud’ and then subtract and reverse – I will never reach those levels. And ‘Whistler’ is (inter alia) a resort in the US – how fascinating.

    Not for me in other words. Too crunkly. But GRAPPLED reminded me of the Pride of Petravore and cheered me up so how bad eh?

  11. A quick glance through the clues before starting led us to guess there was a football-related theme and we wondered if it had anything to do with the World Cup – apparently not, at least not directly. But we managed to tease out all the thematic answers, even those we hadn’t come across before. Favourite among them was GLASSES. And with us too it was a case of “D’oh!” when we got the HOMER references.
    Thanks, Tyrus and mc_rapper67.

  12. One of those Saturday puzzles that completely defeated me. Got a handful of answers but nothing theme-related. Ended up reading Scientific American about dark matter instead. That I could understand.

  13. Thanks for the comments and feedback – much appreciated, as ever. It does seem that several ‘non-footie’/’non-sporty’ commenters here enjoyed this one, although obviously this is a self-selecting sample – there may be many others who threw their hands up in despair/disgust and turned to other things…but if a tree falls in the forest and no-one hears it, etc…

    I enjoyed QuizzyBob’s ‘match report’ at #2, including spending time at the end near the corner flag – that is usually a time-wasting tactic of a winning team!

    Eileen at #3 – technically speaking HOMER in relation to a referee is also an Americanism, at least in Collins, but I am sure it is becoming more widely used over here as well.

    Alphalpha at #9 – I certainly didn’t parse DESPAIR, with the reversal of PSEUD, as I solved it – it was more a case of that going in as matching the definition and the crossing letters – and then ‘retro-parsing’ the wordplay – and if I hadn’t been blogging, I might not have gone any deeper into it than that…

    Tyrus at #10 – thanks for popping in. Looks like most here found this one tough but enjoyable – or should that be tough AND enjoyable?!…

    And Dormouse at #12 – ‘dark matter’ in Scientific American sounds ‘deeply impenetrable’ to me (to quote Alphalpha) – give me a chewy cryptic any day!

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