Daily Telegraph Cryptic No 26641
Hints and tips by Gazza
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BD Rating – Difficulty ** – Enjoyment ***
Giovanni is in a gentle mood today, with nothing too contentious. Let us know how you found it in a comment.
Crypticsue is having a day off, splashing through the rain in her wellies, but she has checked out the Toughie for us and tells me that it’s not as tough as many Fridays. She urges everyone to have a go at it because it has lots that made her smile.
Across Clues
1a Dim cavalier transformed into high-ranking officer (4-7)
{VICE-ADMIRAL} – an anagram (transformed) of DIM CAVALIER gives us a high-ranking naval officer.
7a Where road branches off north in Italian city by front of garage (7)
{TURNING} – the definition here is where road branches off. Insert N(orth) inside the name of a major city in North-West Italy and finish with the first letter (front) of G(arage).
8a In the morning horse doing circuit was very hot (7)
{STEAMED} – the abbreviation for before noon has a literary term for a horse put around it (doing circuit) to make an intransitive verb meaning was very hot.
10a Sloppy Sue, idler, having loads of free time (8)
{LEISURED} – how did Giovanni know that Crypticsue is having a lazy day off today? It’s an anagram (sloppy) of SUE IDLER.
11a Boy knocked over when interrupted by idiotic folk on the move (6)
{NOMADS} – these folk move around a lot. Reverse (knocked over) a male child and insert (interrupted by) a synonym for idiotic.
13a Money-collecting scheme brings pence always (4)
{PAYE} – this is the abbreviation for the tax-collecting system (money-collecting scheme) whereby income tax is deducted automatically from your earnings throughout the year. Start with P(ence) and add an archaic adverb meaning always.
14a Absorb meal as it is mashed up (10)
{ASSIMILATE} – an anagram (mashed up) of MEAL AS IT IS gives us a verb meaning to absorb.
16a No matter what happens, it’s applying to the whole athletics meeting? (2,3,5)
{IN ANY EVENT} – double definition, the second a cryptic description of something that may apply to each discipline at an athletics meeting.
18a Plan concealed by bride always (4)
{IDEA} – concealed in the clue is a plan.
21a Local people’s bother has British intervening (6)
{TRIBAL} – B(ritish) is inserted (intervening) in a bother or nuisance to make a description of a closely-knit local community.
22a A crowd, mostly relations, in a Swiss party? (5-3)
{APRES-SKI} – this type of party is not restricted to Switzerland (hence the question mark) but can take place at any winter sports venue. Start with A and add a crowd or throng and relatives without the final N (mostly).
24a To understand is to make progress, each learner grasped (7)
{REALISE} – the definition here is to understand. A verb meaning to make progress or advance in one’s profession has the abbreviation for each and the letter used for a learner inserted.
25a Description of peninsula in cold place lacking sun (7)
{IBERIAN} – drop the S(un) from a cold region of Russia to leave the description of a Western European peninsula.
26a Giants never somehow able to show a heavenly body (7,4)
{EVENING STAR} – an anagram (somehow) of GIANTS NEVER produces a term used for the planet Venus seen shining in the western sky after sunset.
Down Clues
1d Cambridge maybe can offer model when there’s change all around (7)
{VARSITY} – Cambridge is one example (maybe) of this old term for a university (these days mainly used for sporting events). A verb to model (for an artist or photographer) is surrounded by a verb meaning to change.
2d Group with little intelligence stuck in bit of the crossword (6)
{CLIQUE} – a 2-letter abbreviation (little) for intelligence is stuck inside one of the 28 bits of this crossword to make a small close-knit group.
3d A good forward-looking type, PRO out to be combative (10)
{AGGRESSIVE} – the definition here is combative. Start with A and G(ood) then add a forward-looking type from which PRO has been removed.
4d What makes it hard to see half the errors (4)
{MIST} – something that reduces visibility is the first half of a word meaning errors.
5d Rambling rector and his endless prosy style (8)
{RHETORIC} – an anagram (rambling) of RECTOR and HI(s) makes eloquent and persuasive writing.
6d Greek character holding a dance (7)
{LAMBADA} – the eleventh letter of the Greek alphabet has A inserted to make an energetic Latin American dance.
7d Piece of office equipment made to look fantastic by rep in letter (11)
{TELEPRINTER} – an outdated piece of office equipment (once watched in agonised anticipation by millions on Saturday afternoons as the football results were stutteringly revealed) is an anagram (made to look fantastic) of REP IN LETTER.
9d Recklessness with ridiculous speed needing control (11)
{DESPERATION} – a word meaning recklessness is an anagram (ridiculous) of SPEED followed by a verb to control or restrict the supply of something.
12d Absconding with child asleep (10)
{KIDNAPPING} – the definition here is absconding with. It’s a charade of a child and having a quick doze.
15d Unknown pub in place devoted to luxury (8)
{SYBARITE} – an adjective describing someone who enjoys a luxurious lifestyle is constructed by inserting the second algebraic unknown and a synonym for pub inside a place.
17d Liven up a part of the UK with chum (7)
{ANIMATE} – a verb meaning to liven up is a charade of A, a province of the UK and another word for chum.
19d Bundle of papers, one collected by rough sleeper (7)
{DOSSIER} – insert I (one) in a vagrant or rough sleeper to make a set of documents about an individual person or event.
20d Order the man to get in cream (6)
{BEHEST} – insert a male pronoun (the man) inside a word meaning cream or elite to form a literary term meaning a command or order.
23d Priest in short trousers? (4)
{LEVI} – short means that we have to truncate the proprietary name of a brand of trousers. What remains is a Jewish patriarch and a slang term for a clergyman.
The clues I liked best today were 1a and 22a. How about you?
Today’s Quickie Pun: {TREE} + {MENDERS} = {TREMENDOUS}
Enjoyed this today, not too hard but some tricky ones. Never heard of 15d before, but look forward to being one for the rest of the day. Thanks Gazza.
Fun day today. As Gazza said, quite gentle for a Giovanni, but still enjoyable. I got a bit stuck on 15D until I realized that the middle word of 16A was ANY, not ALL. D’oh. Only bone of contention i would have is calling 7D a piece of office equipment, I’d have though a better description would be an ex piece of office equipment – I haven’t seen one of those in donkey’s years.
Definite lack of cricket clues today
LOL, I did the same for 16A – one of two slips today…as such, the SW corner held me up for a while.
But we got there in the end
Finished all to quickly
Got stuck on 20d as i got obsessed with ‘select’ and my brain would not move on!
I suspect that the crossword editor has lost a crossword. Why? Because I reckon yesterday’s effort was a worthy Friday crossword and today’s looks like a traditional Saturday prize crossword. I get so confused when I can’t tell the day of the week by the crossword!
Thanks as ever to setter and reviewer.
No problem today except, realising 18a was a hidden word, I put DEAL.What a wally!
Just saw your comment .. that makes at least two of us!
Make that three
that makes four
And four – made sense to me
OK Mary – you got there first so I am five!!!
You have to be quick here Lea
A bit slow off the mark here but I make it six!
And I’m whatever the next number is!
I think I must be 8
And me as well,which held me up for ages.
Didn’t like 23d, levi seems hardly truncated at all. i also had the for the middle word of 16a , all in all not my best day !
Heh, me too – spotted my mistake pretty swiftly as 9d was a very clearly worded clue, and couldn’t possibly have been anything else.
Ditto!
Enjoyable – 15d was new to me also, and didn’t help myself by putting ‘deal’ for 18a. Liked 23d. Thanks to all involved today.
Nice puzzle today, I had ‘icecold’ in 25a for ages col being peninsula inside iced for cold and was a bit miffed to find it wrong. Ne’er mind eh ?.
The Toughie is worth a go today as well, not as hard as normal Fridays.
Thanks to G an G
Nice try, but if icecold was the answer he might have used cool or freezing rather than cold in the clue.
I agree about the Toughie today – I really enjoyed it!
Me too. I recommend it to all.
Thanks to Giovanni for an enjoyable, not so tricky puzzle, and to Gazza for the notes.
I’ve returned to Spain from my summer hols in the UK, lethargic and with a dreadful cold. This was a pleasant and gentle awakening. Agreed with Skempie about the equipment, but maybe newspaper offices still have them. Also fell into the ALL/ANY trap, but couldn’t find slobarite in the dictionary, even tho’ I feel like one!
Help me please,only one left to do, 11 across! I agree with the previous comments but I did enjoy it,until I got stalled ! Thanks
Hi nutty62 – welcome to the blog.
The answers are hidden between the curly brackets under the clue. Just highlight the space between the brackets to reveal.
Managed all but two on my own! Has to be a record. Thanks Giovanni for that chance
and to Gazza for the two I couldn’t get. My favourite was probably 2a for the ‘penny drop’.
Hi Gazza, ‘nice’ pics today but are you sure those are a pair of Levis?
2*/3* for me today, fav clue 2d, never heard of 15d and was totally stuck there, so thank you for that and the rest of the review, finished a while ago but have been busy painting doors and singing along with the radio! all tunes from 1965!! total nostalgia, love Radio Wales, have a good day everyone 
Well that was a nice Friday outing – thanks Giovanni and thanks for the review Gazza.
I liked 2d and 11a topping my list.
Rained very heavily this morning – hope it is like yesterday and clears up for the afternoon. Crossed over the M25 about half hour ago and it was a parking lot heading south – everybody trying to get away for Bank Holiday I guess.
It’s not rained here much this week and the afternoons have been sunnier than the mornings but although it’s dry its not sunny yet, going to see Only Men Aloud in our local theatre this evening, have seen them once in Cardiff, brilliant, can’t wait, nice meal in restaurant first of course
Hope you are having a great evening.
Don’t know who “Only Men aloud” are. do I need enlightening?
Enjoy yourself Mary
Thanx
Thanks to the two Gs for the very gentle crossword and the very nice review.
I know we don’t like to mention times on BD’s blog, but it has just taken me 27 minutes……to access the website. Maybe it’s one out/one in. Enjoyed this from Giovanni although not really any easier for me as the priest delayed completion for some while. I would like to have a go at the Toughie today, but as the connection was lost in trying to navigate to it, I may just give up and move to the Grauniad’s functional free site.
I received an answer to a complaint to the CluedUp site today and they tell me they are working really hard on the problem, and will continue to do so throughout September, so several more frustrating weeks ahead, I fear.
Enjoyable as always on a friday. Held up puzzling over 20d until penny dropped – too many words _e_e_t I could think of before the one I needed! Also not sure about the answer to 10a – is that a proper word that people use?
Ian,
Leisured is an adjective used to describe people who don’t need to work for a living, e.g. the leisured classes.
Gazza,
sort of guessed as much, but it’s clearly too far from my experience to be a reality … alas!
Ian
Enjoyable. Did all bar 1 (22a) during my lunch break but the penny clicked over tea in the afternoon. What will I do this evening? The toughie perhap?
Should not 13a be (1,1,1,1) since the answer is not a word but an acronym, or is it acceptable to call it (4) in Crosswordland?
It’s interesting – at what stage does a commonly-used set of initials become a word? Presumably “radar” and “scuba” have made the leap, so why not paye?
Except of course radar and scuba are said as words. Paye is still said as initials – at least I think so…
I agree with Horatio. It hasn’t reached word status, and if it did, would we pronounce it pay or pa-yee?
… and LASER?
I’m with Nora on this one. PAYE is not one word, and seeing as this is the backpage puzzle, I would have expected to see it as 1,1,1,1.
A pedantic point, but no big deal
I’m not sure. If the answer to a clue were PC PLOD would you expect the enumeration to be (1,1,4) or (2,4)?
I’d go for (2,4), but I would expect to see a ? at the end of the clue to suggest it is a little ‘iffy’. Going back to the original query, I’m not convinced that anyone would accept that PAYE is a 4-letter word (pronounced as it is written) in the English vocabulary.
I agree that PAYE is not a word, but neither is PC so shouldn’t they be treated the same?
Yes – but as I said above, I would expect to see a ? at the end, to suggest that perhaps something is amiss.
Came back yesterday from a sunny few days in France – it’s chilly and has been pouring with rain ever since we woke up this morning!:sad:
Not TOO difficult today but, for me, probably a bit nearer 3* for difficulty – perhaps I’m just out of practice! Along with several others I had deal for 18a which really didn’t help much with the bottom left hand corner. I liked 1, 14 and 22a and 2, 5, 12 and 23d. Thanks to Giovanni and Gazza.
Did manage to get my hands on one crossword during the week away – there was a clue that I really loved – think that it may have been the Saturday or Sunday one so, not wanting to end up in the naughty corner on my first day back, I won’t write the answer but the clue was along the lines of “rescue from drowning” and something else to do with “someone in an uncomfortable situation”. Brilliant – well, I thought so anyway!
Kath,
I think that the clue you’re after is 9d in last Saturday’s puzzle, for which Gnomey has already published the review – so feel free to sing the praises of the clue – either here or, preferably, on that blog.
OK thanks – will do precisely that! I thought it was wonderful and should go down in crossword history as one of the great clues.
Thank you Giovanni for the first of two nice Friday-off crosswords – lots of nice clues but I liked the made-me-smile quality of 4d best. Thanks to Gazza too. I hope I am not sloppy but was definitely ‘leisured’ today.
Set off in pouring rain, sans wellies as Gazza suggested above, which was a bit of a mistake, went to Margate to visit the new Turner Gallery (very good) came out in broad sunshine so put our macs back in the car and went for an excellent three course Indian lunch (£10 each, it’s great being a ‘concession’) and came out of the restaurant to rain pouring from the sky in stair-rods
Then we went to the Hornby Visitor Centre in Ramsgate, lots of train sets, Airfix, Scalectrix etc and a superb display of model cathedrals. Back home again, still raining, for a nice cup of tea. A very nice leisurely day out.
Just stopped raining in Oxford for the first time today – going to take a VERY fed-up dog for a quick walk. She definitely thinks that service is not as good as it was before we went away and that we’d better buck our ideas up or she’ll be packing her little spotted hankie!
Since bedtime last night, we’ve had over an inch of rain. Its stopped now and there’s a hint of blue sky but I am not holding my breath. The BBC South East programme is live from Herne Bay this evening so I think some of the black clouds I can see are lurking in wait to pour on them at 6.30
Enjoyed this but like others before put “deal” and like Nubian “ice-cold”. Maybe the latter was wishful thinking for some sunshine and that Icecold in Alex thing.
Weather foul here today and we are off to the lakes tomorrow! Big mistake!
Thanks to setter and Gazza for the hints.
A little late after a hard day at work, but managed to get all bar 15d so thanks to Gazza for enlightenment, and to Giovanni for a pleasant workout. A word I’ve heard before but probably couldn’t put into a sentence!
I feel very sorry for the sodden masses descending upon Devon today. The North Devon link road was a car park from the M5 to Barnstaple. Thank goodness for a little local knowledge of country lanes.
Hope it brightens up for everyone this weekend.
Only managed to START this over a pint at about 7 p.m.
Lucky it was on the gentle side as I had a fried brain from works and the M25. It managed to raise my spirits so thanks to Giovanni and gazza for the review.
Did not manage to start this one until 7pm tonight and completed in just under 3 hours, with reference to 4 hints. I feel not too bad since this this is after my nearly-two-year-old grandson being in charge of me for 11 hours. 22a was really good. Many thanks to all concerned
No too difficult but had to think hard about 11a, 20d and 4a. No especial favourites today.
Late input from me as I nearly forgot to collect my DT last evening and was busy with other problems.
Much gentler fare from the Don.
Likes : 1a, 22a, 25a, 1d, 3d, 12d & 15d.
We had another admiral yesterday!
Why CH for 22a? – one can ski elsewhere!