Oh no! It’s Nimrod on a Wednesday!
Phew! This was a bit of a struggle (as expected!) – but we got there in the end, with a fair amount of checking.
Fortunately, 2d informed us that there is a ‘nina’, although we would tend to refer to the connections between the pairs of across entries as a ‘theme’. We are old enough to have seen the original TV series of ‘Star Trek’ and recognising some of the characters appearing in the grid helped us to finish the puzzle – particularly with 15ac, 24ac and 27ac.
‘Star Trek’ first appeared on Canadian and US TV screens 60 years ago this week. It did not arrive in the UK until 1969.
Thanks to Nimrod for yet another mind-boggling puzzle.
FAIR (just) round (‘transfixed by’) K (1,000 – ‘grand’)
A reversal (‘in retirement’) of SEEK (‘try’) round (‘accepting’) an anagram (‘modification’) of IRON’S
ALAS (regrettably) COT (cotangent – ‘function’) after ROY (‘Melchester’s’) – a reference to ‘Roy of the Rovers’, a football comic strip from the 1950s – 90s – Roy played for Melchester Rovers. Bert remembered this despite having no interest in football whatsoever and was amazed that Nimrod could clue ‘Roy’ as ‘Melchester’s’ – not exactly a synonym! See comment #1
Hidden (‘holding’) and reversed (‘back’) in stORYTeller
A reversal (‘turn’) of NO (number – ‘#’) BRACe (2) missing the last letter (‘almost’) – CARBON is no. 6 in the Periodic Table
Hidden (‘drinks’) and reversed (‘over’) in WaDE MEETS Evert
OCH (Scottish sign of impatience, as might be used by Andy Murray) ‘tucking into’ BRIE (cheese)
VAC (short for vacation – ‘quick break’) after KO (kick-off) round (‘involving’) C (first letter or ‘top’ of Croatia) I (international). Google informs us that Mateo Kovacic plays for Manchester City and the Croatian national team
WAS in (‘caught between’) S AND P (first two letters – ‘couple’ – of spademen)
HAM hOCK (pork cut) swapped (‘recycled’) with the first letter missing (‘lopped’) – Ockham’s (or ‘Occam’s’) Razor is a philosophical principle – Joyce remembered that it featured in a crossword some time ago, but Bert had forgotten all about it
H H (two husbands) ‘getting involved with’ U U (two Us – ‘us’)
An anagram (‘dancing’) of RITUAL + C (‘about’) round (‘pierced by’) ALA (‘after’) – a new language for us!
CE (Church of England – ‘religious establishment’) in (‘ministered by’) an anagram (‘panicking’) of EAST END
pUt aLl oUr aRt oUt – missing the first and last letters of each word (‘in the open’) – a reference to the sacred rock in Australia formerly known as Ayers Rock
A reversal (‘counter’) of SOMA’S (‘superdrug’s’ – as in “Brave New World”) + A (accepted)
A clue-as-definition: Hidden (‘carried’) in CelebratioN IN Acrosses – a reference to the theme
ACHE (suffering) in BED – the ‘implication’ seems to be that if you were in bed with an ache, you would be ‘long suffering’ – we’re not convinced! See comment #4 below for a more satisfying explanation!
An anagram (‘elaborate’) of OF W (women) TRY TO
HIT (met? – as in ‘met the deadline’?) THE SACK (dismissal)
An anagram (‘in a state’) of E (earl) and GOVERnInG missing the two ‘n’s (‘news’)
Double definition – we had to check both!
An anagram (‘disgruntled’) of ARE BODS and THE
RING (arena) round (‘welcoming’) EACH (‘a person’)
HI (‘good day’) AT (doing) USES (exercises)
LP (record) LATES (‘unpopular shifts?’)
mORAL (right) missing the ‘m’ (first letter or ‘start’ of mock)
VIA (‘walk, say’ – a road) in (‘overlaid with’) A RY (railway – ‘track’)
Double definition
10a: the Melchester footballer was Roy Race, so Nimrod wasn’t really taking a liberty. The definition is presumably just ‘Meeting’, otherwise ‘Race’ is doing double duty. Thanks B&J.
Thanks Hector – that makes more sense.
Ah. The joys of a Nimrod. Beyond my pay grade as usual so there would appear to be little point in moving on to Io in the FT! Quite pleased to get about 50% of this before coming here to marvel at the constructions – and the abilities of our bloggers to work them all out. And, of course, I was nowhere near spotting the Star Trek characters. Congrats to all who made their way through this one unscathed.
I did enjoy the anagram for BROADSHEET and ESTEEMED is beautifully hidden in the tennis surface.
Thanks both
PS: in 3d I took ACHE (verb) to be indicated by LONG, and being IN BED to imply suffering.
You seem to be ‘on form’ this morning Hector. We think your explanation makes more sense.
BEACHED….3(d), as awful as it is, I thought to “BE ACHED” implied, long suffering?
Wow. Added to my already insurmountable difficulties by thinking the Nina would be around the perimeter. Gave up on it with about 40% completed, and came here for a lesson from our amazingly impressive bloggers, so big thanks to B&J.
Hoping for an Eccles next Wednesday!
Half of this puzzle might have been written in Klingon, as far as I’m concerned.
Notwithstanding the difficulty level, I’m afraid there’s just too many poor clues, and definitions.
GREAT GAME = MAIN, for e.g.
When “number” defines a random “42”….not quite the ultimate answer, is it?
The confusion of “NINA” with a “theme”, exemplifies the inexactitude of this setter, for this solver. And, a theme which evidently detracted from the quality of the clue constructions.
Not my bag of chips, but thanks as ever to BJ
I struggled to parse 25% of the clues and thanks for the list of explanations.
Basically what PostMark@3 said.
I struggled to get about 45% of this then gave up and came here – thank you Nimrod for the workout and thank you B&J for the explanations of those I did and didn’t get.
HIT THE SACK
I think the first part is whimsically interpreted as HIT THE SACK.
NINA
As opposed to some solutions being theme words, each theme word
is in the form of a NINA. I think the clue is fine.
Just a bit too much…
Thanks Nimrod and Bertandjoyce
I’m glad I’m not the only one who struggled with Nimrod’s cruciverbal challenge today – when I saw his name below the grid instead of Eccles I exclaimed something which I shan’t repeat here!
I did well to complete most of the grid without any help – and realising that there were Star Trek characters reading across the rows helped me slightly, but overall I found it to be a tad too clever for my liking
Thanks Nimrod and B&J
I should learn setters’ various disguises then I wouldn’t have wasted so much time puzzling over this. Managed one corner, revealed 1d, thought huh? and gave up. I’m still not convinced by soma as a superdrug. And a couple of spademen for s and p. Why not a couple of supercalifragilisticexpialidocious – pick two letters, any letters.
A nice theme. How about doing it again in something more approachable.
Wouldn’t normally criticise a setter but did feel that MAIN was on the wrong side of fairness.
Given the large number of words that are -A-N I think choosing 2 very obscure meanings of one of them was unreasonable.
I can just about imagine GREAT (as in main rivals = great rivals) but can’t imagine great=game in any scenario.
Were we meant to know this or spend hours looking up obscure meanings of every word that is -A-N ?
Shame as I really enjoyed this otherwise – much helped by the theme which I saw early.
A sharp contrat to yesterday’s crossword where I didn’t see the ‘Reggie’ theme despite doing the crossword this morning, having watched the 1st 2 episode of the series on the Beeb last night!
Thanks to Nimron and BandJ
Thanks both. Well I did see the NINA/theme/what’s its face and it helped me unravel a few, but otherwise a great idea spoiled by many of the clues and the answers; even some of the more straightforward elements were a stretch e.g. as an anagrind disgruntled which means unhappy, but you first need to exchange it for upset to get a more acceptable indicator.
Well I’m glad I persevered (via several mid-solve reveals) and that I then came here afterwards; I feel better knowing that others also found it tough! 😝
Given that 2d intentionally gave the game away, I refrained from matching the horizontal pairs until I got stuck. At which point I unexpectedly found SCOTTY and UHURU (having assumed we’d be doing Hitchhiker’s Guide; FORTY-TWO is quite an odd appearance then), decided it would be too easy to apply the theme directly, and forced myself to solve BRIOCHE and ANTECEDES without it. (It helped that those two gave the characters whose names were least familiar to me as a non-fan).
But that’s as far as it went. I’d never have got SAND WASP, CARBON or FAKIR without recourse to the theme. And didn’t even then, as it happens; there’s no such thing as a land wasp, apparently; while fakir was a nho and carbon was just too good.
I’m not a lover of themes which give too much help, but I appreciate the effort that went in to it. The failings were all mine, of course.
Thanks both
I don’t have the resolve of AP@17 and happily used the the hidden characters to help complete the puzzle. (And I agree that they are nina’s, as explained by KVa@11.)
Thanks all
Same here: searched today for its various celebrations, found KIR K in the top row, and went from there. Very much needed the check function, which corrected my L-PHASES; stuck in GEORGE VI and II willy-nilly until I was told I was done, thinking the clue involved Georgia somehow; and had a parse rate well south of 80%. All fair game for a weekday Enigmatist I reckon. (I still have one clue outstanding from his Prize!)
Thanks B&J for your suffering – er, I mean services.
Balladeer@19, alas still a good six outstanding for me still 🙈
Got all of two answers after an hour.
Came here for some answers and only slightly the wiser for it – found this one utterly frustrating, but reassuring to see wiser folk than me similarly discombobulated. Roll on tomorrow’s puzzle!