c4countdown

Hello everyone, I hope you had a great Christmas and New Year, as we return to the screen with Series 74.....

Oh no, we don't, because for the first time in 7 years, we have a CHAMPION OF CHAMPIONS TOURNAMENT!!!

Players from Series 67-72 are returning for an all-out battle which should be pure entertainment for the next 3 weeks.

The first of the 8 preliminaries sees the Series 72 champion Tom Cappleman take on the Series 69 semi-finalist Glen Webb.

Also, in a change to the layout of the usual knockout rules in finals, the winners of consecutive games will play each other in the following rounds, as opposed to the winner of the first playing the winner of the last, second v 2nd last, etc.

So, today's winner will play tomorrow's winner in the quarter-finals in 10 days time.

Here are the statistics.....

Statistics Corner:

Firstly, Series 72 Champion Tom "The Enfield Enforcer" Cappleman - 11 Games, 11 Wins, 1,259 Points. (Average: 114.45)
Highest Score: 135 vs. Jack Roberts (4th Game)
Lowest Score: 98 vs. Gavin Woolnough (Quarter-Final)
9's Achieved: 3/4
Total Points/Max/%: 1259/1393 (90%)
Letters Points/Max/%: 757/849 (89%)
Numbers Points/Max/%: 422/434 (97%)
Conundrum Points/Max/%: 80/110 (73%)

Secondly, Series 69 Semi-Finalist Glen "The Cradley Heath Cleaver" Webb - 10 Games, 9 Wins, 1,134 Points. (Average: 113.4)
Highest Score: 141 vs. Martin Wilsdon (5th Game)
Lowest Score: 82 vs. Callum Todd (Semi-Final)
9's Achieved: 7/12
Total Points/Max/%: 1134/1359 (83%)
Letters Points/Max/%: 730/868 (84%)
Numbers Points/Max/%: 334/391 (85%)
Conundrum Points/Max/%: 70/100 (70%)

Gloria Hunniford returns in DC as well. The good thing about starting a new year thankfully we'll have DC guests on Monday to Friday in the next few weeks at least.

Join Andy for the first recap of 2016 later.

Superb game, chaps. Very high quality, well done both.

Great game. Thought we could be on for a record for a bit there.

Standard method in round 9 of course - (2-2)/(9-8-1)=411.

Great start to the competition and at least all of the nines were in the dictionary before the nonsense update. Well done to you both.

Unlucky on missing out on the joint-record, Tom. I only just got the last numbers game myself and if you use the wrong method to make the nine, it can be easy to miss under the pressure.

LINOCUT in round 1.

Surprisingly few comments for the first game of such a big competition. Well, it's going up by one now.

+1

Good game. Glen seemed to gamble way too early though (unless he didn't have a 6 in that round)?

Dat last numbers though