Don't worry, I've made sure this post is up before going to bed where I am.
Penultimate Episode of Series 79, can't believe six months has past since it's started and we're nearly at the end!
Letters: Incredible playing from both players (Up to R8), with Mike spotting DUSTMAN. An even more thrilling performance from Mike with TALONED in R10 and AMOUR in R12! Commiserations to Alan in that section though...
Numbers: Mike was sure playing it safe by sticking to his usual combinations but blanked out in R9 which I feel bad for. Alan's gamble in R14 sure did throw me off by going for six small and given that since he only ever played it once in the Preliminaries, I knew this was the end for him and I was so dead right.
(Maybe if he had gone for his "usual" the ending wouldn't have been so bad...)
Conundrum: I had no idea NEGAHOLIC was an actual word until Ray hinted at this in the Daily Chat. As a person that loves Chemistry, I got the answer in no time at all so I'm proud of that!
I was rooting for Alan to get this to at least try and redeem himself but it turned out to be Mike that solved it instead. Oh well...
I predicted Martin would win by about 20 points but the margin was 28 points at the end. Everything was going so well in the first two-thirds of the show (Apart from R9) for Alan and then in the last third, painfully saw the slow but sure demise of him through the invalid word declarations and the failed six small gamble.
I wouldn't say it was a "spectacular" flop, I would just say it was probably Semi-Final nerves that got the better of him over there. Nevermind Alan, at least this was a remarkable improvement from your QF and the fact that you managed to beat Andrew Jackson against all the odds over there was just stunning! Hope to see you around Apterous sometime soon!
The big day arrives tomorrow, with the #1 and #2 Seed facing off against each other. Who will get to lift the Richard Whiteley Memorial Trophy and have a Merry Christmas on top of that? Stay tuned for the final episode of Normal Countdown in 2018 as the Battle of the Northerners airs!!
Progress:
QF1 (13 December):
Martin May (#1) vs Bob Lunt (#9) (
115 - 86)
QF2 (14 December):
Mike Daysley (#2) vs Adam Rolston (#8) (
104 - 58)
QF3 (17 December): Andrew Jackson (#3) vs
Alan Duval (#7) (60 -
62)
QF4 (18 December): Dave Ashton (#5) vs
Tony Manwani (#6) (79 -
114)
SF1 (19 December):
Martin May (QF1 Winner) vs Tony Manwani (QF4 Winner) (
93 - 83)
SF2 (20 December):
Mike Daysley (QF2 Winner) vs Alan Duval (QF3 Winner) (
97 - 69)
GF (21 December): Martin May (SF1 Winner) vs Mike Daysley (SF2 Winner)