Spoilers for Thursday 16th December 2021 (Series 84, QF 2)

[Thomas Carey]

Stu vs Roddie. Trash talk probably not included

[Philip A]

I had MUSELAAR in R1.

[Gavin Chipper]

I thought Roddie looked a bit put out when Adrian said "I'm very happy" and then disallowed his word. But then again Susie does that sort of thing all the time, frequently starting with "Yes..."

[Tom S]

Good game between 2 worthy finalists. Loved Stu's 747 bit...

[Gavin Chipper]

Good game between 2 worthy finalists. Loved Stu's 747 bit...

Yeah, should have got 10 points for that.

[Ryan Lam]

Not so good news with a record breaking number of COVID-19 cases yesterday thanks to the Omicron variant, but hey, the show still goes on no matter what; no one wants to have it suspended like what happened in the middle of last year. What is good however, is that both contestants today are dressed for the occasion in some way. Stu with his "!" symbol shirt (which Philip kindly pointed out in the Daily Chat is a reference to what he does when he chats sometimes on Apterous) and Roddie with his Christmas-themed sweater. Maybe that'll cheer us up a little...

Letters: Great spot by Stu who finds BOETIES in R5 and perhaps later on, probably sealed Roddie's fate in R11 with LIONHEART. However, Roddie was great as well, not least to mention spotting MANQUE in R12 and to end off with getting POWDERISE with Stu in R13. That was really excellent!

Numbers: Stu picks his usual for both his selection, but possibly in a state of panic, didn't get quite as close to Roddie in R3 which was very tough to crack (there's in fact only one solution for that round). The latter then gambles in R6 with 4 Large but alas, it wasn't the one he would have hoped for. A manageable R9 went by followed by that impossible R14 which made all of us at home give up. Then, this happened:

Loved Stu's 747 bit...

Yeah, should have got 10 points for that.

Of course, who wouldn't want to forget Stu's cheeky paper aeroplane with "747" written on it? Finally, a contestant manages to make a plane joke about this! And as Dr. Anne-Marie quite rightly said, it goes out with a bang. Hey, I'm not complaining, at least the Numbers were more tricky today! Moving on swiftly...

Conundrum: This was way easier in terms of the difficulty level compared to yesterday's one, and with Roddie buzzing and getting it correctly, that takes the total combined score to be just shy of 200. Damn, if not for that impossible R14 it could have happened which is a shame

I predicted the margin of this game to be around 40 points, but Roddie sure wasn't intimidated by the thought of facing the #2 Seed with the margin at 30 points eventually. That was a great game all-round, and you should be proud of it! Thank you also for taking care of people's funerals in some way or another in real-life which must not be easy in this COVID-19 pandemic. Hopefully you'll continue to stay safe out there, it's not easy to do such a job especially in one which involves handling deaths.

So, who will face Stu next Wednesday? Will it be "The Wife of the Runner-up of Series 82 and first Octochamp under Anne Robinson's tenure" Florence Cappleman-Lynes, or "Child Prodigy who survived his second game due to a very unlucky misstep by his opponent but barely missed out on Octochamp status" Jasamrit Rahala? I bet this is the game you all want to watch right? I think there'll be a lot more people in the Daily chat tomorrow, we'll see...

Progress:
QF1 (15 December): Ahmed Mohamed (#1) vs Janet Noe (#8) (143 - 59)
QF2 (16 December): Stu Harkness (#2) vs Roddie Bell (#7) (112 - 82)
QF3 (17 December): Florence Cappleman-Lynes (#3) vs Jasamrit Rahala (#6)
QF4 (20 December): Jeremy Slaney (#4) vs Matt Gould (#5)
SF1 (21 December): Ahmed Mohamed (QF1 Winner) vs (QF4 Winner)
SF2 (22 December): Stu Harkness (QF2 Winner) vs (QF3 Winner)
GF (23 December): (SF1 Winner) vs (SF2 Winner)

[Phil H]

Took me until the second half to notice Stu's "!" top.

Good game played in a good spirit, well done to both.

[John Garcia]

Another good game.

Can anyone give some insight into the mock finger-wagging fight during the end credits??

[Thomas Cappleman]

Great game there. Ruth had commented at the end of the last numbers that there seemed to be a lot of concentration for a clearly impossible one. Glad to see Stu had been making good use of it

[David Williams]

Great game there. Ruth had commented at the end of the last numbers that there seemed to be a lot of concentration for a clearly impossible one. Glad to see Stu had been making good use of it

From what I remember the closest you could get was 585 away. Is this a record?

[Jojo Apollo]

Another excellent performance from Stu. Great plane making skills also.

[L'oisleatch McGraw]

Good game between 2 worthy finalists. Loved Stu's 747 bit...

Yeah, should have got 10 points for that.

Or even 747pts!
Best. Contestant. Moment. Ever!

[Fiona T]

Big Stu fan, and consider him a mate, so very unbiased viewpoint, but he's gotta come over as one of the most likeable contestants in memory. Regardless of what happens in the SF/final would be great to see him back for any CoC/40BC. Dunno if his personality came across because of Anne or despite her, but I reckon she's a Stu fan too.