Spoilers for Tuesday 10th February 2026 (Series 93, Heat 27)

[John Garcia]

How did they not spot that Henry is a P.E. teacher?
Today's episode came with a "Danger Guidance" warning on 4od. I think I know why:
R1: AMNIOTES as an alt 8
R2: PEAKIER for 7
R4: URCHINS for 7
R12: SPOILAGE as an alt 8, but the dict suggests PILOTAGES for 9 would be valid, as it's listed as a noun, but not "mass noun".
R13: UNBOWED for 7, but dict says that WOMBLED is perfectly valid for 7. They give the example sentence: "once we'd arrived back in Cambridge, we wombled quietly home".

Wtf???
p.s. I think the guidance warning was for dictionary errors!

[Gavin Chipper]

Yeah, I noticed the WOMBLED and PILOTAGES thing. Also got PEAKIER. And NOURISH and ANCHORS in round 4.

[Philip A]

Susie also defined PILOTAGE, which doesn’t actually have a definition in Oxford Dictionaries Premium. Are they using a different dictionary or other websites such as Google?

Also I think they need to scroll up and down the page when they search for inflections. Had Susie scrolled up she would have realised ‘womble’ with the small w.

I hope The Countdown Team is aware of these discrepancies that cause Susie to accidentally say the wrong information.

[Gavin Chipper]

I hadn't noticed the warning. Specifically it says "Dangerous times". I think the particular wording needs to be highlighted.

[Philip A]

Had an email reply and others have had exactly the same:

Hi Philip,

Thanks for your email.

As you may be aware, the Oxford Dictionaries Premium is constantly evolving to best reflect current English usage.

Both of the words highlighted - PILOTAGES and WOMBLED - were invalid entries at the time of recording.

However, since recording, these words have been reclassified and are now valid.

Many thanks,

The Countdown Team

At least they’ve realised the mistakes. I think the problem lay in the suggested inflections being ruled invalid by human error, not the dictionary itself ruling them invalid.

[Tony Atkins]

I hadn't noticed the warning. Specifically it says "Dangerous times". I think the particular wording needs to be highlighted.

I spotted this too - I always thought it was division that was dangerous.