Spoilers for Friday 23rd June 2023 - (Series 87, QF 3)

[Ronan M Higginson]

2nd rematch of the finals if Peter beats Greg.

[Gavin Chipper]

(3×8+10+9)×9-1=386 for round 3.

I'm watching slightly behind live so it's possible Rachel has got this after the break already in case I'm duplicating.

[samir pilica]

R12 FEMOCRAT

[Ronan M Higginson]

Good game by both players and nice to see a 2nd rematch confirmed. Anyone know if there's ever been 2 rematches in a set of finals before?

[Thomas Carey]

Good game by both players and nice to see a 2nd rematch confirmed. Anyone know if there's ever been 2 rematches in a set of finals before?

30 35 37

[Marc Meakin]

Well done Peter.
Looking forward to the all Ireland rematch

[Ryan Lam]

I've had multiple Internet issues so this is coming later than I wanted it to be. One last week of Countdown in Series 87 (One this week, four the next) and Maggie Aderin-Pocock is back with us talking about her Barbie doll which was trending earlier in the year. We've got Peter who's denied meeting Cillian before and Greg back with yet another three piece suit, let's see who is smart enough to get through!

Letters: Good even start from both contestants although people in the Daily Chat didn't seem to like the idea of Greg saying "Please" every time a letter was chosen, oh well... I'm guessing the Numbers rounds had affected Greg after the Anecdote section as he couldn't keep up with Peter afterwards Unlucky especially with matrices in R12. On a sidenote, I agree with Colin, maybe if contestants want to declare a word involving numbers, they should spell it out to prevent him getting confused

Numbers: Expected Peter to use his 6 Small tactic in R3 and it happened, only for it to backfire on him as Greg is closer to the target (By the way, no one on the Daily Chat managed to get the answer in 30 seconds, so if you did, well done)! CECIL then throws up the maximum possible target in R6, alas Greg took the dead end route as Rachel mentioned and got himself stuck, allowing Peter to get ahead By the time R9 came, I think Peter most likely didn't want another flop and went for a safer option, no surprises if that was the case and it did help with Greg drawing a blank. Finally, Greg wants to go mad in R14 but I guess that didn't happen with both contestants grabbing ten points there!

Conundrum: Talk about coincidences, I actually work in real-life in an estate that has the same name as the answer here! I would have gotten it but Peter was quite quick on this one and with his correct guess, he takes a leap over the century to set off a rematch between him and Cillian five months on!

Not exactly a fierce fight as I had thought out and I had originally predicted a margin of 25 points, but it was much wider at 43 points. Greg, I'm sure this was not how you wanted things to play out, but the fact that you looked genuinely surprised when Colin showed you the Finalist plaque (I'm just curious how did you not know this beforehand, maybe a new week of recordings meant you forgot about it, I don't know?) shows that your efforts have paid off and you played well enough to be here, albeit might I say Pouvanen really was a Maths genius that ended your run prematurely, but who cares. Hoped you went home happy and of course, not empty-handed!

Good game by both players and nice to see a 2nd rematch confirmed. Anyone know if there's ever been 2 rematches in a set of finals before?

30 35 37

This is the second rematch in a single Series, and not since 1997 did we see that happen! As we enter the final week of this Series, it can't get even more exciting can it? Hope you've all rested well over this weekend, the first of the Summer as we hit the halfway mark of the Finals with the first confirmed rematch! Who knew that the circle would be complete with these last two contestants who appeared in previous Series, "Aged considerably since his last appearance and unfortunate to lose previously over a pasta" Graham Moonie-Dalton and "Appearing just one series after Greg and fate has probably brought him here" Adam Dexter, and who knew both of them would face each other just barely three weeks later. Can Adam get his revenge or will the outcome be the same again? We'll surely find out soon enough!

Progress:
QF1 (21 June 2023): Ronan Higginson (#1) vs Andrew Barrett (#8) (122 - 70)
QF2 (22 June 2023): Cillian McMulkin (#2) vs Dave Cappleman (#7) (109 - 81)
QF3 (23 June 2023): Peter Burke (#3) vs Greg Pearce (#6) (107 - 64)
QF4 (26 June 2023): Graham Moonie-Dalton (#4) vs Adam Dexter (#5)
SF1 (27 June 2023): Ronan Higginson (QF1 Winner) vs (QF4 Winner)
SF2 (28 June 2023): Cillian McMulkin (QF2 Winner) vs Peter Burke (QF3 Winner)
GF (29 June 2023): (SF1 Winner) vs (SF2 Winner)

[Philip Wilson]

R12 FEMOCRAT

I had 'formicate' in that round, but it looks like it's in 'certain dictionaries only'. (something to do with ants).