Enigmatic Variations No.1023 – Phoenix by Rasputin

I’ll get my grumble out of the way first: the crossword editor should be hanged. There were FIVE length errors (46 across and 2, 16, 32, 42 down). These didn’t make solving harder, but such mistakes can do so, and are in any case unacceptably sloppy. Also, 38dn should have been hyphenated, and this did affect the difficulty. Furthermore, speaking of affects, 31ac read ‘AFTER AFFECTS’, rather than ‘AFTEREFFECTS’.

No one who solves the Enigmatic Variations with any regularity will be inclined to the opinion that perhaps the editor had an off day, as errors are far too common. In summary, next time I suggest that the editor uses the time-honoured technique of actually looking at the puzzle. With their eyes.

Now, onto someone (actually, some people – ‘Rasputin’ is a team) who did do their job properly.

The puzzle was tougher than recent EVs. I found the shaded area in the centre a particular challenge, as one couldn’t be sure of many of the letters, at least until one had the message. In fact, I had the ‘over-riding instruction’ before I had the ‘finishing proposal’, which led to a certain amount of head-scratching.

Most of the thematic answers made theme pretty obvious. The eight were:

BATSMAN, MAIDEN, STUMPS, BAIL, OPENERS, CREASE, MID-ON, TOSS

Now, I know next to nothing about cricket, but I didn’t need to. In keeping with the theme, once I finally worked out the clashes, the shaded area’s ‘proposal as to how to finish off the puzzle’ read BURN THE GRID AND SEND THE ASHES. But (hopefully) before the solver reached for the matches, the ‘over-riding instruction’ was discovered to be ONLY JOKING – SEND AS NORMAL.

These ‘fake’ instructions were a nice touch.

I noticed that both ASHET and GNASHES appear in the grid. Such curiosities always interest me, as I wonder if they are indicative of some abandoned alley of the creative process.

However, there was one problem. Doesn’t the subsidiary indication of 25ac involve an indirect anagram? I can’t see that even a charitable reading of ‘cycling’ would involve moving the first letter to the end, although that might be what was intended. Despite the fact that ‘confident’ = SURE isn’t a tough leap, admitting indirect anagrams would risk making puzzles effectively unsolvable.

Setting that aside, this was a pleasantly-taxing way to spend a number of hours when I should have been otherwise engaged. Thanks to Rasputin’s components.

P.S. I’ve not managed to parse 21ac. Apologies.

Notation
(xxx) = definition
{xxx} = (anagram/homophone/container/etc.) indicator
XXX* = anagram
< = reversal
xxx = unused letter(s)
Idlers=redundant word

Please post a comment if the explanations are not clear.