Toughie 3204 – Big Dave's Crossword Blog
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Toughie 3204

Toughie No 3204 by proXimal

Hints and tips by Dutch

+ – + – + – + – + – + – + – +

BD Rating – Difficulty ***Enjoyment *****

I enjoyed this, only just into 3* time. The clues all read very nicely

Please leave a comment telling us what you thought.

Across

9a    Sheep gathering around after a drink (9)
AMERICANO: A type of sheep containing (gathering) the 2-letter Latin abbreviation for around, all after A from the clue

10a    TV presenter Richard having no tips for singer (5)
ADELE: The surname of TV presenter Richard without the outer letters (no tips)

11a    Nit perhaps beset by wound in Roman province’s running event (12,4)
THREELEGGED RACE: I’m used to the first word being hyphenated. What ‘nit’ is an example of goes inside (beset by) a verb meaning wound, all inside (in) a Roman province

12a    King aboard vessel with aluminium exterior (7)
FRONTAL: The Latin abbreviation for king goes inside a vessel used in baptism, plus the chemical symbol for aluminium

13a    Upset tons with rebuke (7)
TEARFUL: The abbreviation for tons and a rebuke or reprimand

15a    Title to divine  German tale? (15)
RUMPELSTILTSKIN: I misspelt this at first which of course gave me some problems later. Not really two meanings, but two definitions and the whole clue could also read as a definition

19a    Be seen leaving Aberdeenshire rum that’s plundered (7)
HARRIED: An anagram (rum) of ABERDEENSHIRE without (leaving) the letters in BE SEEN

22a    Players directed and made changes on board (7)
CASTLED: The players in a movie or theatre, and a word meaning directed or guided

24a    Politicians in private, most cautious banning outsiders (4,11)
HOME SECRETARIES: A word meaning ‘in’, a word meaning private, then a 7-letter word meaning ‘most cautious’ without the outer letters (banning outsiders)

 

26a    First of Camorra dons turned clean (5)
SCOUR: The first letter of Camorra is inside (dons, as in ‘wearing’) a word meaning turned or gone off

27a    Moves from position and avoids being pierced by missile oddly overlooked (9)
DISLODGES: A 6-letter word meaning avoids contains (pierced by) the even (oddly overlooked) letters in ‘missile’

Down

1d    Tense quarrel after leader’s demoted (4)
PAST: A quarrel or row with the first letter moved down two spaces

2d    Item passed down on radio broadcast tower (8)
HEIRLOOM: A homophone (on radio) of a 3-letter word meaning to broadcast and a verb meaning to tower

3d    Mum is coming over fast (6)
SILENT: A reversal (coming over) of IS plus a Christian fast

4d    Swift beasts fixed look over hawk coming north (8)
GAZELLES: A 4-letter fixed look, and the reversal (coming north) a word meaning to hawk

5d    Scrapped opening of obituary that’s nasty in newspaper (6)
FOUGHT: The first letter (opening) of obituary and an exclamation of disgust (“that’s nasty”), all inside the abbreviation for a pink newspaper

6d    Light vehicle in America stopped deer, so Spooner says (8)
HANDCART: How Americans might say stopped and a stag deer, as Spooner might say

7d    Crazy amount this account might show — unfathomable (6)
BEHALF: An anagram (crazy) of AMOUNT + (THE ANSWER) gives UNFATHOMABLE

8d    Simple home requires fences (4)
MERE: Hidden ( … fences)

12d    Conducive to thrill abandoning stream for river (5)
FORTH: A preposition that means ‘conducive to’ or ‘in favour of’, plus TH(rill) without (abandoning) another word for stream

14d    Gave wrong information holding note that’s wrinkled (5)
LINED: A 4-letter word that means ‘gave wrong information’ containing (holding) the abbreviation for note

16d    One despatched from base, girl on a railway (8)
EMISSARY: The base of natural logarithms, an unmarried girl, A from the clue and the abbreviation for railway

17d    Sides of invention fold up (8)
INCREASE: The outer letters (sides) of inventions and another word for fold

18d    Big profits from book about misfortune (8)
KILLINGS: A biblical book goes around (about) a 3-letter misfortune

20d    Type of film from Hammer, say, set in space (6)
ROMCOM: The initials(?) of American rapper Hammer inside (set in) a word meaning space

21d    Cut around East End (6)
DECIDE: Reversal (around) of a word (past tense) meaning cut, then the abbreviation for east

23d    Kept feeding pig, constant companion (6)
SHADOW: A 3-letter word meaning kept or owned goes inside (feeding) a pig

24d    Legwear selected, but no top (4)
HOSE: A 5-letter word meaning selected, but without the first letter (no top)

25d    Elite soldiers, hard band (4)
SASH: Some special forces and the abbreviation for hard

I enjoyed 7d, which took me a while to see, but I think my favourite is 15a (which also took me a while to see!). Which clues did you like?

28 comments on “Toughie 3204

  1. I think proXimal’s toughies are tough because he disguises his definitions very well, e.g. 12a, 7d, 21d and even 15a I guess. So those 4 were pretty sneaky and I liked 9a and 20d too.
    Thanks to proXimal and to Dutch.

  2. Most enjoyable. 7d gave me some gyp but the penny dropped during a chat with ALP on the backpager blog.
    Re 11a, the puzzle app has the first word hyphenated, as Dutch expected it to be.
    Thanks proXimal for the challenge and Dutch for the review.

  3. I don’t understand the first part of 15a. Steady progress and towards the gentle end of the spectrum for a Friday.

    Thanks to proXimal and Dutch.

  4. As Philbert says, 7d required some Reverso, especially with its rather buried definition. Very clever, if a tad mean. But this was hugely enjoyable – some lovely clues. I see the ever-impressive Dutch has marked 15a as his favourite. And, while I bow to his greater judgement, I remain unconvinced. As a double definition it just seems a tad loose to me. I’m pretty sure there must be other German tales to which this applies (not with this letter count perhaps and certainly not with these checkers, but still). It read more like a quick than a cd/dd. But I may well be wrong – I often am. And it does make a change to have a spare afternoon rather than spending the day sweating over an Elgar. Not a criticism of the great man in any way, just an admission of my own inadequacy. Many thanks to proXimal, and Dutch, of course.

  5. How encouraging to complete the Friday Toughie. Very enjoyable but I bunged in 7D and 15A and still can’t understand the parsing. I must be dim. I also thought 11A should be hyphenated. Lots of ticks but I liked 23D.
    Many thanks to Dutch and ProXimal.

    1. 7d in (outer letters of invention, sorry typo in hints)+ crease=fold
      15a Rumpelstiltskin is a german tale which involves guessing his name ( title to divine)

  6. We did wonder how to get 16 letters into 11a. Quite a lot of head-scratching for 7d too.
    A really enjoyable and challenging solve for us.
    Thanks proXimal and Dutch.

  7. An eminently approachable Friday Toughie, requiring modest GK and considerable lateral thinking. Still perplexed by my biffed 7d – I understand the anagram element but not how the purported definition relates to the answer.

    The incorrect enumeration of 11a (printed from the site) was a mild frustration but otherwise the three long clues went in relatively swiftly.

    So many great clues, but I’ll go for 1a, 22a, 18d & 21d.

    Many thanks to Proximal and Dutch

      1. D, 7d. I was just wondering, and I might be completely wrong, if the confusion with the definititon is because it should be just “account” and not “this account”?

  8. Somewhat late to the party here.
    Encouraged to give this Friday Toughie a crack from the comments on the back pager I found it challenging enough for me but enjoyable and to a large degree rewarding.
    However I absolutely could not see how to parse 7d and my answer was a bung in from the crossers, and now having read the hints I get the construct but not how the answer fits the clue?
    For 11a I reached for Dutch’s help with the parsing, but even with that, and I know I am going to regret asking, I am still no wiser so would someone please help me see what must be obvious – I get the Roman province, but nits and wound???
    Thanks to Proximal and Dutch, and to whomsoever can shine light on my darkness…

    1. P, 11a. Nit perhaps (EGG) beset (or surrounded by) wound (REELED*) gives: REEL(EGG)ED. All placed in (inside) Roman province (THRACE) – [TH]REEL(EGG)ED [RACE]

      * As in: The string was wound/REELED around a stick.

        1. Thank you, silly mind block as I could only see wound as in do harm not as in wind. Nit is a bit more perplexing as I did not think it an egg so much as a parasite( although you do get nit eggs).
          Time for me to do a bit of research!
          Thanks for your help.

  9. Some discussion on 15A.

    In the eponymous tale the heroine has to find out (ie divine) the titular characters’ name (ie title) hence the answer is the title to divine.

  10. Made a start this afternoon & finished it off this evening. Great to get a Friday Toughie that I’ve a reasonable prospect of completing. Disappointingly failed to register an unaided finish as my last two in 7d & even more annoyingly 13a (couldn’t think of the rebuke synonym) only yielded when I revealed the F checker but pleased to parse them all. Certainly the trickiest puzzle of the week as you’d expect & very enjoyable too.
    Thanks to proXimal & to Dutch

  11. I know that I am being thick but I still do not understand the answer to 7 down, despite reading all the hints and tips. Could someone please put me out of my misery by using words of only one syllable (or less ha ha) in the order of thought that is needed to reach the answer. I did guess “behalf” because it was the only word that fitted the letters I had, but I don’t get how behalf is the answer to any part of the clue. TIA

    1. Welcome to the blog, Gay Freeman.
      7d is what’s called a compound anagram. You have to make an anagram (crazy) of AMOUNT + your answer (this word meaning account) to get UNFATHOMABLE. Another way of getting to the answer is to remove the letters of AMOUNT from UNFATHOMABLE and make an anagram of what’s left to get BEHALF.
      Behalf means account as in the request “Don’t go to any trouble on my account/behalf”.

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