Spoilers for Thursday 11th December 2025 - Series 92 1st Quarter-final

[Philip A]

No. 1 seed Jase Cullen plays the only non-octochamp, seven-time winner Shemina Kirby.

You know the drill… the conundrums get harder!

[Philip A]

Very good score from Jase and good spirits from Shemina.

I got CONFUTES, didn’t know ENSWATHE, but got the last numbers using Rachel’s way and I also got the conundrum in 1 second. I only had SOLIDI for 6 in the LIBIDOS round.

CHILLAXED reminded me of a TV show that had a short run: 101 Ways To Leave a Game Show once asked, “One of these words is not in the dictionary?” and the answer was ‘chillax’, though that question quickly became out of date by the time it aired in 2010. A modern word, but not too difficult of a conundrum.

It’s a shame the No. 9 seed didn’t qualify. I think he would have scored well VS Jase.

[samir pilica]

R6 IDIGBOS (if it's still valid).

[Philip A]

R6 IDIGBOS (if it's still valid).

Yep, still in.

[Ryan Lam]

It's three weeks until a brand new year, but first, it's that time of year again, no not Christmas, we're talking about a Countdown Series Finals here! It's the debut Finals where Discord is involved and where the Daily Chat has migrated to, so that's nice to see an upgrade! However, even before we start, controversy has arisen in the form of Brett Davids (who's playing tomorrow) spoiling that the Countdown Team decided to forbid contestants from wearing jumpers due to an incident where someone refused to wear one (very likely from Series 90 by my guess) which is such a shame I thought people like Peter Burke, Harry Savage, Viraj Seelam etc. in years gone by wore lovely ones on-screen for us to enjoy, and that was a letdown for him and our #1 Seed who had brought in one for filming and we'll now never see them. Oh well, let's see what happens next year for Series 94. Back here though, let's welcome back "Jase and Status with the Highest Score after the ODP Cull to-date" Jase Cullen (thanks Colin for breaking the real and filming timeline because the Athletics Championship in Japan was held in September, before Jase's games aired) and "Shemazing and hoping to pop Shampagne (see what I did there? ) if she wins" Shemina Kirby. Just like Michael Kane half a year ago, I bet she was wondering if she would make it in and she scraped through. It's nice for her to acknowledge that there were so many potential Octochamps this Series that could have been in the Finals instead but had their runs ended (Angus Faraday and John Pakenham are the names that comes to my mind). Alright, enough of an Intro, let's crack on then!

First Third: Gentle start in R1 (although some were surprised with Jase missing CONFUTES) and with him pulling ahead in R2. Also, if you didn't roll your eyes at the Shemina puns, then I guess you're used to such cheesy things, what a "sham" . Oh hello, Jase decides to go for 3 Large for starters which surprised us. Easy if you spot it, but alas Shemina didn't and the gap widens by ten points Nothing else to say here really...

Second Third: Nice Christmas Teasers all round (I hope the Countdown Team keeps a relevant theme in mind moving forward as I've noticed for a few weeks now ). ENSWATHE was a hard word to spot (only one person did in the Daily Chat), so well done to Jase for doing so in R4. Shemina goes for 1 Large in R6 and if you can't even spot a solution here, literally, call for help! Bad luck to Shemina after the Anecdote where jongeurs and daigios (the latter which I knew immediately she tried to spell daigous) are invalid But hey, she needs points, so Jase goes back to the simple 1 Large in R9 and what do you know, CECIL goes easy again here, some consolation I guess! I'm not complaining in this case!

Last Third: Dang, Shemina's not having any luck here either with Jase getting Max after Max where in some rounds, there were so many Words as Maxes that she could have gotten them However, a redemption for her in R13 with INVADERS to match Jase's SANDIVER, so not all was lost. Final 1 Large from her and with a difficult puzzle foxing both contestants, in comes Rachel to save the day. Time to crack Hard Conundrums again thereafter, and let's hope the streak of 1/7 solves for the past two Series will be broken. Talk about a dream where I can watch in HD where Susie is in her LEXICAL duties all day. Jase's buzzed in with a word which is so damn modern I would have never gotten the answer. Just like Colin, my jaw dropped and I went "No way that's valid now" even though it has been since the 1990s. Well done, and no, trust me, I did not watch Netflix after the show.

Very good score from Jase and good spirits from Shemina.

I got to give credit to Philip because he predicted the scoreline almost quite accurately on Discord where he thought the game would end 120 - 40 whereas I predicted Jase winning with a margin of 70 points and that was some way off (and yes, I never predict final scores), so kudos to him. Poor Shemina, I thought she would get thrashed here and she absolutely did, but she did have a go in her own words, and the fact that she did have fun both on and off-camera shows that she took her defeat in her stride, and perhaps when she's with her friends the next time round, they'll gladly welcome her with the Countdown Theme tune all over again!

Jase's dreams of watching the Grand Final live in a cinematic theatre just got one step closer and he'll be back next week. But, before the week ends, we've still got another match to go. Will "The Dental Extractor and Goliath with his 4 Large Starters and a Max Game" Brett Davids or "The Sole Finalist to be a newbie to Countdown and having a notably low scoring win" Mark Allen survive to see another episode?

Progress:
QF1 (11 December 2025): Jase Cullen (#1) vs Shemina Kirby (#8) (121 - 43)
QF2 (12 December 2025): Brett Davids (#2) vs Mark Allen (#7)
QF3 (15 December 2025): Ben Hocking (#3) vs Ricky Cohen (#6)
QF4 (16 December 2025): Ciaran McCarthy (#4) vs John Payne (#5)
SF1 (17 December 2025): Jase Cullen (QF1 Winner) vs (QF4 Winner)
SF2 (18 December 2025): (QF2 Winner) vs (QF3 Winner)
GF (19 December 2025): (SF1 Winner) vs (SF2 Winner)