Monty Panesar was on Celebrity Mastermind and it did not go well

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Monty Panesar on Mastermind (iPlayer)

We love Monty Panesar – absolutely love him – but his Celebrity Mastermind appearance was not a triumph.

The pressure clearly got to him during the general knowledge round and he appeared to lose the ability to comprehend English sentences.

What followed was a sort of word association exercise where Monty blurted out whatever happened to be passing through his brain each time John Humphrys stopped talking.

Monty gave some very fine wrong answers. It’s actually quite hard to say which wrong answer was the finest. We’d probably narrow it down to these two.

Number one

Monty was asked which season of the year was described by the poet Keats as “a season of mists and mellow fruitfulness”.

After a string of terrible answers and passes, this question presented him with an opportunity because it pretty much boils down to ‘name a season’.

Presented with a one-in-four chance of getting an answer right, Monty went with “Oliver Twist.”

Number two

Monty was asked the title of the first volume of CS Lewis’s Chronicles of Narnia.

We dearly hope that among all the other rejected names for the Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, CS Lewis briefly and inexplicably considered “CJ Lewis.”

You can see Monty’s whole capitulation via the iPlayer or the bulk of the general knowledge round on this Twitter video.

21 comments

  1. Was the answer to one of the questions “Diamond”?

    If yes, then I would have got one right, in that situation.

  2. Poor sod. He was pleading to be put out of his misery towards the end. What was his specialist subject that he managed to get 7 on?

    1. He got 6 on his specialist subject which was on Sikhism and its history. Made a tactical error by asking the host to repeat a long question which wasted time, otherwise he did well.

      The one question he got right on general knowledge was the first, ‘how many holes are on a snooker table’.

  3. I remember a discussion I’ve had with both Michael Wagener & the Godfather Paul Ford of the BeigeBrigade, regarding which cricketers you’d want on your quiz team. Paul was of the opinion you’d never win a quiz with a team of bowlers. Now I’m not sure I’d want any cricketer, bowler or otherwise, on my quiz team.

      1. I was going to say “Isa Guha has a PhD in neuroscience from UCL” but it turns out this factoid is incorrect 🙁 She was trying to do one but only got as far as an MPhil.

        http://uclporticomagazine.co.uk/magazines/portico_issue4/extra-curricular17/

        Any other cricketing PhDs about? I wondered about Brearley, but no, his PhD was unfinished too. I fear cricketers are too busy to finish off such pursuits…

        http://archive.camdennewjournal.com/feature-interview-former-england-cricket-captain-mike-brearley-talks-mathew-lewin

      2. Educated XI

        Gordon Degreenidge
        B.Ed Smith
        Mark Greatbachelor’s
        Faf du Plethesis
        Paul Collegewood
        BA Stokes
        Billy Murdoctorate
        Student Broad
        David Masters
        Mushtaq Pre-med
        D.Phil Tufnell

      3. There’s M. A. Noble, M. A. Taylor, M. A. Butcher and M. A. Atherton – but none of them can have done a PhD, they’re so thick they haven’t even worked out the M. A.’s supposed to go after their names.

      4. You’re *really* going to ignore MS Dhoni and Dean Jones for this? They’re somewhat banging on the selectors’ door, no?

  4. Pat Cummins supposedly can solve cryptic crosswords in 30 mins. He can be on my team even otherwise.

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