Sunday Telegraph Cryptic No 2531 – Hints
Hints and tips by Big Dave
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A few hints to get you started on this excellent puzzle from Virgilius.
Don’t forget that you can give your assessment of the puzzle. Five stars if you thought it was great, one if you hated it, four, three or two if it was somewhere in between.
As is usual for the weekend prize crosswords, I will select a few of the better clues and provide hints for them.
Peter Biddlecombe’s full review of this puzzle will be published at 12.00 on Friday, 16th April.
Continue reading “ST 2531 – Hints”
Sunday Telegraph Cryptic No 2530
A full analysis by Peter Biddlecombe
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BD Rating – Difficulty ***** – Enjoyment ****
Four-letter words scuppered me in this one – at 1D I wrongly had SHED when the large number is “shed load”, and at 23D I missed LEFT as one of the possibilities for ?E?T, and gave up with WENT, BELT and RENT all fitting only half of the clue. Both my fault, though helped by a fear/loathing of 4-letter words with common checking letters. Also helped by not realising that one apparent double definition was actually triple.
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Sunday Telegraph Cryptic No 2530 – Hints
Hints and tips by Big Dave
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If you were lucky enough to get into CluedUp this morning, or perhaps you purchased the Sunday Telegraph, here are some hints and tips to get you started.
Thought for the day – how long does a company persevere with an outsourcee that consistently delivers below-standard performance? Answers on a postcard to The Telegraph Group!
Don’t forget that you can give your assessment of the puzzle. Five stars if you thought it was great, one if you hated it, four, three or two if it was somewhere in between.
As is usual for the weekend prize crosswords, I will select a few of the better clues and provide hints for them.
Peter Biddlecombe’s full review of this puzzle will be published at 12.00 on Friday, 9th April.
Continue reading “ST 2530 – Hints”
Sunday Telegraph Cryptic No 2529
A full analysis by Peter Biddlecombe
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BD Rating – Difficulty **** – Enjoyment ****
A notch or two harder than most of the Sunday puzzles for me. The most interesting clues for me were 1A and 1D – both as cryptic clues and as a possible controversial comparison! (BG has expressed one or two political opinions in other puzzles.)
Continue reading “ST 2529”
Sunday Telegraph Cryptic No 2529 – Hints
Hints and tips by Big Dave
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The usual few hints to get you started.
Don’t forget that you can give your assessment of the puzzle. Five stars if you thought it was great, one if you hated it, four, three or two if it was somewhere in between.
As is usual for the weekend prize crosswords, I will select a few of the better clues and provide hints for them.
Peter Biddlecombe’s full review of this puzzle will be published at 12.00 on Friday, 2nd April.
Continue reading “ST 2529 – Hints”
Sunday Telegraph Cryptic No 2528
A full analysis by Peter Biddlecombe
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BD Rating – Difficulty *** – Enjoyment ****
This puzzle has a grid that looked a bit scruffy but grew on me after I looked harder – every word length from 4 to 12 is included, and 11, 12 and 13-letter words can easily be under-used, so 3 of these is a good feature. And of course someone who contributed to the Times puzzle’s exemplary set of grids is not going to give us one with isolated sections or under-checked words. Quite a tricky puzzle by Sunday standards, taking me about as long as an average Times cryptic.
Continue reading “ST 2528”
Sunday Telegraph Cryptic No 2528 – Hints
Hints and tips by Big Dave
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Don’t forget that you can give your assessment of the puzzle. Five stars if you thought it was great, one if you hated it, four, three or two if it was somewhere in between.
As is usual for the weekend prize crosswords, I will select a few of the better clues and provide hints for them.
Peter Biddlecombe’s full review of this puzzle will be published at 12.00 on Friday, 26th March.
Continue reading “ST 2528 – Hints”
Sunday Telegraph Cryptic No 2527
A full analysis by Peter Biddlecombe
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BD Rating – Difficulty ** – Enjoyment *****
Sorry for lateness of this report – lost copy and had to resolve. The usual elegant but not too difficult Sunday outing, with some special bits to note.
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Sunday Telegraph Cryptic No 2527 – Hints
Hints and tips by Big Dave
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Don’t forget that you can give your assessment of the puzzle. Five stars if you thought it was great, one if you hated it, four, three or two if it was somewhere in between.
As is usual for the weekend prize crosswords, I will select a few of the better clues and provide hints for them.
Peter Biddlecombe’s full review of this puzzle will be published at 12.00 on Friday, 19th March.
Continue reading “ST 2527 – Hints”
Sunday Telegraph Cryptic No 2526
A full analysis by Peter Biddlecombe
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BD Rating – Difficulty *** – Enjoyment ****
Three Brian Greer trade-mark clues in this puzzle – the long hidden word at 23A, and the two all-in-ones at 3D and 6D. Moderate difficulty and the usual elegant clues – away we go …
A few minutes late with the blog as I couldn’t get onto CluedUp this morning – clues below courtesy of a copy wisely kept by Dave. I’d already decided not to give every last shred of wordplay any more – let me know if I’ve left something out that needs explaining.
Continue reading “ST 2526”