A match report by Yidong from Cloete house:
The First Round & Semi Final:
In the first round, Cloete knocked out Nilsson by 34 points to 26, despite the scores being tied with just four race questions left. Gilks narrowly edged out Harrison by 24 points to 22, a gap of just one question, whilst Langley and Blurton won against Stewart and Warner respectively.
Cloete beat Langley 34-26 in a replay of the semi-final that
had gone the other way last year, and Blurton were victorious against Gilks to
seal their spot in the final.
The Final:
The usual buzz spread throughout the school on the day of
the final, and a large queue had even formed outside room 220 before the match!
Unfortunately, most filtered into Chess Club in room 221, but a large crowd of
four people came to watch, nevertheless. The line-ups for the match were Aryan
(4th), Yidong (5th), Lucien (6th), Ashok (L8th) and Terry (U8th) of Cloete
House, against Blurton’s team of Haoming (4th), Aron (5th) Kevin (6th), Richard
(L8th) and Daniel (U8th), with the Hans Woyda aficionado Mr
Cullen-Hewitt as the referee.
Cloete launched themselves into a four-point lead across the
first two rounds, with each question worth two points (which could have just
been one, as every question was worth two points). However, it was the
famously tricky probability round that made the difference, and this time, it
would be about picking songs from a playlist of ten songs on Spotify! Whilst
both 4th Formers got their questions right, Cloete managed to bag the next
three questions, whereas Blurton struggled for the rest of the round, giving
Cloete an impressive ten-point lead after three rounds.
During the first four questions of the challenging geometry
section, Cloete extended their lead and brought the scoreline to 28-16. With 12
points left to be won, this meant that another correct answer from Cloete or
just a single mistake from Blurton would have handed Cloete the win, and both
of those things happened on the next question, about the length of a spiral
staircase. As such, Cloete sealed their crown, sparing everyone the nerves of a
thrilling race. Nevertheless, with the exciting new addition of buzzers -
coincidentally in house colours too, with a golden buzzer for Cloete and a red
one for Blurton - the Cloete 4th and 5th Formers buzzed their way to victory,
whilst some hasty honking by both 6th Formers ended up in Blurton getting the
points, and the match ended with one question apiece for each house in the
Lower and Upper Eighth races, giving a final score of Cloete 36-20 Blurton.
- Yidong
Here’s the question that sealed the deal for Cloete - can you solve it in under 90 seconds?
