Good news for those of you wanting to try the Independent cryptic - puzzles are now available online on the same day as they appear in the newspaper (Saturday puzzles are still a week late though).

 Thanks to Eimi for mentioning this in a comment on today’s Indy puzzle.

 Neil

Solving time: 12 minutes

After yesterday’s tough Nimrod, and a generally tricky week all round in most papers, this made a nice change with a straightforward Phi challenge. 4ac was a bit of  a tease with either of two answers able to go in, and I went for the wrong one first!

Incidentally, there is a gathering of Guardian Crossword solvers meeeting for a cruciverbal natter on Sunday next from 1pm at The King’s Arms, Roupell Street, Waterloo.  If you are in the area, go and join them.

 ACROSS  (*) = ANAGRAM    (R) = REVERSAL    (CD) = CRYPTIC DEF.

1   PUNCH     Double def - a drink and the late lamented magazine, beloved of dental waiting rooms and school libraries (well, Prescot Grammar School’s for one!)

4  STRAGGLER   Strangler with G for N.  I had this the other way round and this held me up for a little while.

9 PUNJABI    PUN + JAB +  I

10  NOSEBAG  First letters of Oats, Stuff, Every, Breakfast inside NAG

11 ROOM TEMPERATURE     ROO (Bounder) + TEMPER inside MATURE .

12  HIP FLASK    HIP (trendy)  +  FLAS(h) + K (last of “drink”)

14  MENIAL    IN (R) inside MEAL

17  NISSEN    Hidden answer -  Nissen huts are prefab type shelters from WW2, I think.

18  CARYATID      IT AY  (It always) (R) inside CARD

20  QUEEN OF PUDDINGS  OF  (Old Fellow) + PUDDING (Fat fellow) inside QUEENS

22  INTRADA    DA after  TRAIN*

23  OCARINA   Where would the crossword compiler be without the Ocarina?  OCA (Middle of “vocal”) + R (range) + IN A

24  EASY TERMS   (CD)

25  FIEND     E inside  FIND

DOWN

1   PAPER THIN    PERTH inside PAIN

2 NON COMPOS MENTIS     COMMENT, SPIN and SOON* 

3  HEART    R inside HEAT

4  SKIRMISH   R inside SKIM + I + SH

6  GOSSAMERY  A thoroughly weird-looking word!    S + SAME inside GORY 

7  LABOUR INTENSIVE    URBAN TELEVISION*

8  ROGUE  My favourite clue of the puzzle  

15  LADY’S MAID    DAY DISMAL*

19  OFF AIR   O + (A)FFAIR

20  QUITE  Change the last two letters of QUIET

21  DWARF  WAR inside D (Germany / Deutschland) & F (France)

Thanks to Phi for an enjoyable puzzle.

Solving time - 17:05

This started out fairly straightforward and I made good progress, thinking I was going to finish inside 10 minutes for a while. Then I got stuck in two places, with the pair at 8d/10a, and three crossing at the bottom 18d, 23a/d. Still, today’s Times took me twice as long, so I can’t grumble.

Update: Beermagnet has spotted a mini-theme - see if you can spot before looking at the comments!

Across
9 HORSEPLAY - Equus is a play by Peter Shaffer, so that’s HORSE PLAY. If you remove the space you get the word for tomfoolery.
10 OUT,DO - nice cricket reference, and well-disguised definition, which is just “cap”.
11 MIN(C)I,NG
16 F(OUR-L)ETTER WORDS - At first I thought this was to do with Lynne Truss, maybe her book Talk to the Hand, which is about rudeness. But no, it’s OUR L (Guardian’s line) inside FETTER (truss) + WORDS (discussion). Anyway, I got it from the fact that 4, 8, 22 & 23d were all four-letter words and worked the rest out later.
19 LUD(I,CR)O,US - more self-reference, this time US = setters.
21 GO(OD)O - what you’d say if you were glad. Not what I’d say, but someone would perhaps!
22 P(I)B,ROCH - basically just an anagram of (Pb, choir), but written so that you know the I is between P and B, the rest elsewhere. Not keen on “mediocre” as anagind though.
25 (b)OB,LIVIOUS(Louis VI)* - took me a while to see where OB came from (I don’t have any kids).

Down
2 GRAND CRU - this is (narcotic drug)* without otic (not aural).
5 EYE,WIT,NESS - clever build-up of this answer: mark of King Edward (potato)=EYE, joker=WIT, crime-fighter=(Eliot)NESS.
6 TOMORROW - not sure about the easy listening music scene reference though. Maybe it refers to the song from the musical Annie? [ Thanks to Mick H, the wordplay is TO MOR (abbreviation for middle-of-the-road), ROW=scene. I would never have spotted that! ]
8 BOO,T(ree) - not sure why this took me so long. I’ve seen enough American films to know that BOOT=trunk.
14 MATRONHOOD - Hattie Jacques often played the Matron in the Carry On films.
15 DIS(POSSES)S
17 L(ACROSS)E - “unlike this clue” is a nice touch.
18 RO(O)T,CROP - I held myself up here by thinking it would be ????ROOT, which also blew my chances of getting 23a.
23 MULE - “mewl”

I found this very tough but a thoroughly enjoyable solve. Lots of great clues (my personal favourite is 12a), and a very clever touch at 19 and 20d. I’m still unsure about 17a, 21a and 18d though.