How to write a University Challenge blog post

I’ve been trying to find ways to drive up subscriptions to this blog, because I’ve not been very good at self-promotion, and I came across this article which purports to be able to instruct one in the formatting of a post in order to increase engagement and reader enjoyment, so I thought I’d go through the tips and tricks to see how well I’m doing and if there are any areas of potential improvement.

Point 1 - Most blog posts aren’t written for humans

I’m definitely writing for humans. What would a robot want from all of my inane chatter? No change needed there.

Point 2 - Use section headers to arrange ideas

Well, I’ve done that today, but only because this article told me to. Let me know how its going.

Point 3 - Draw the eye with lists.

Lists are the cornerstone of scannable content

I’m not actually all that sure I want scannable content, but if that's what powers the click machine then:

• Maybe
• I’ll
• Have
• To
• Start
• Doing
• Them

I could have also done those as a numbered list, but I didn’t want to force you to have to read them all out just for a weak joke. At least with bullet points you’re spared that. Small mercies.

Point 4 - Keep paragraphs and sentences short

Ah, shit. Perhaps I should have read this one before starting the blog, given that my opening paragraph is a single sentence consisting of seventy four words (the optimum being 2-12 words for a sentence and 2-4 sentences per paragraph) and the fact that this sentence is already pushing fifty words.

Point 5 - Embed videos to support readers

Well, what a perfect opportunity to say that if you haven’t watched it already, here’s a link to tonight’s episode, so you can watch it before reading the review. Back on track!

Point 6 - Keep your blog post the appropriate length

Uh oh, we haven’t even properly started yet, so this one isn’t going well.

Point 7 - Be obvious.

Duh!

To end this farcical introduction, I will quote from my friends Year 4 creative writing notebook, which I had the pleasure of reading this weekend, and which contains its own fair share of writing advice, in a manner of speaking:

How a bike works.

The wheels are connected to the chain in some kind of way. Don’t ask me how the chain works.

When I was at work earlier I had such a clear idea of what I was going to mean when I quoted that, but now I’m less sure. I guess the point is to say that I don’t really know what I’m doing, as evidenced by my clear lack of regard for an objectively superior formatting style.

Everything is supposed to be connected in some kind of way. Just don’t ask me how it works.

Anyway:

1. Thats
2. Enough
3. Of
4. That

Here’s your first starter for ten...

Glasgow have made only one quarter-final appearance in eleven series throughout the Paxman Era, but have been a staple of recent years, only failing to show up for the first round in one of the last eight tournaments. Queen’s, meanwhile, have also been on the show eleven times, but have three quarter finals to their name.

I keep saying that I’m going to learn how to code, and one of the things I could do fairly easily if I had done that would be to tell you whether or not eleven was the highest number of appearances shared by two teams in a match of University Challenge.

Durham played Edinburgh in the second round in 2020-21, at which point it was Durham’s 21st appearance and Edinburgh’s 20th, so there have been matchups with a higher total number of appearances, but have two teams ever shared a number which was higher than eleven?

Two more points now:

1. Did that even make sense?
2. Was it more boring than the introduction?

I’m getting quite into these lists now, not going to lie, but let’s get on with the show.

The first question features the quote ‘Have nothing in your houses that you do not know to be useful or believe to be beautiful’, which must have inspired Marie Kondo’s ‘Does this spark joy?’ catchphrase.

According to the instructions outlined above, the Marie Kondo quote will offer better reader retention, but I think the William Morris one is more poetic. I don’t know which one Glasgow’s Miller prefers, but she recognises Morris and takes the first ten points of the evening.

Bonuses on women who were their countries first heads of state followed, and they took two, knowing about Indira Gandhi and Golda Meir but not Corazon Aquino. Miller then gets a second starter, buzzing in with knitting based on a set of clues which included ‘Tom Daley during competition downtime’, which is a brilliant bit of question setting.

Queen’s get up and running on the next starter, with Juneteenth, and they take a full set of bonuses on pomegranates. The first picture round is the ideal set for my boss, who loves flags, and one of whose favourite questions is ‘can you name all of the flags with birds on?’, because it's about a bunch of flags with birds on. Glasgow get the starter and take a hat-trick, with one of the bonuses featuring a bit of purple on the Dominica flag (one of his other favourite questions being 'what are the two flags which have purple on'? The other being Nicaragua).

We have the first neg of the night on the next starter, as Campbell jumps in early with Manchester Ship Canal. Yousif doesn’t let Paxman finish the question before coming in with his own incorrect answer of the Grand Union Canal. The correct answer is the Bridgewater Canal, which is a great place to run along, although I did once get shouted at for wearing an Arsenal top.

A second of the evening for Sharry gave Queen’s a bonus set on the films of Dee Rees, but they don’t manage any of them. Brennan hits back for Glasgow, and they extended their lead with one bonus on CBT, but they can’t gain any momentum and Sharry continues his solo effort for Queen’s with a third ten pointer. They’re quite unfortunate on the bonuses, giving Handmaid’s Tale instead of The Testaments and Bringing up the Bodies instead of Wolf Hall.

The music starter goes to Sharry - he’s the only one who looks close to getting Calamity Jane. They suffer an unfortunate hat-trick on the bonuses, mentioning all of the correct answers but at the wrong time. Glasgow pass one hundred points and have a lead of fifty five. I was about to type that someone other than Sharry will need to step up for Queen’s if they’re going to have a chance - and he duly takes his fifth starter, but this is followed up by Campbell’s first, and suddenly they’re only fifteen adrift.

Both teams take an age to decipher a clue about gorgonzola, but McInerny is the first to manage it. There aren’t many blue cheeses whose name features a creature from Greek mythology, are there, so what else could it have been, folks?

Not knowing the correct answer, or perhaps thinking there was a genuine chance she was right, Nunziante takes the opportunity to buzz in with Don’t Be a Menace in South Central While Drinking Juice in the Hood on the second picture round. The correct answer is Do the Right Thing, but Queen’s aren’t able to take advantage of Nunziante being a menace.

They do get the bonuses, however, courtesy of an absolute stab in the dark from Sharry, who is delighted to have plucked Persian from somewhere in his subconscious. He even rubs his hands together with glee, but not in a supervillain kind of way. A bonus set with two easy and one hard put them fifteen clear, and another starter from Sharry, his seventh, put them in charge going into the final few minutes.

McInerny, who looks a lot more comfortable now he has a buzz under his belt, gave them even more breathing room, and Glasgow weren’t able to recover, failing to score a single point more.

Glasgow 105 - 165 Queen’s Belfast

A remarkable turnaround there from Queen’s, who flipped the scores comprehensively with a 115-0 run to end the match. One of those teams who could grow into the competition, now that they’ve got the nerves of the first game out of the way. Commiserations to Glasgow, who looked like they ran out of steam.

Aaaaand... apologies to everyone who read through the introduction to this post, but if you’ve made it this far then you’ll probably want to subscribe, won’t you? Click a link somewhere on this page (imagine I’m a YouTuber pointing at a box) and you’ll never miss a post within the maelstrom of your Twitter feeds. See you next week.

Post Script

Point 8 (not from that article, but it still counts) - Make the title interesting

Which is why I have, for the first time ever, deviated from the tried and tested, but undeniably boring, method of naming my blogs after the episodes in question. We'll see how this goes - if it works we could be on for a clickbait tornado in the coming weeks.