The guarder of Seville!
QUESTION
Has a goalkeeper ever saved all five penalties in a shoot-out?
The greatest number of consecutively saved penalties in a penalty shoot-out is four. To be able to save that many is contingent on the opposite goalkeeper saving a few as well.
In 1986, unfancied Steaua Bucharest won the european Cup — now the Champions League — by beating Barcelona. The deadlock could not be broken in normal play or extra time, so after 120 minutes it went to penalties.
The 6 ft 4 in goalkeeper helmuth Duckadam saved four consecutive penalties. his counterpart Javier Urruticoechea had saved the first two Steaua penalties — all the penalties were on target — thus allowing Duckadam to achieve his feat. It earned him the nickname the hero of Seville in his native Romania.
A missed penalty is not always as a result of a goalkeeper’s intervention. Who can forget Chris Waddle launching the ball into orbit in the 1990 World Cup semifinal to see West Germany boot england out of the tournament.
Jim Harris, Truro, Cornwall.
QUESTION
In 1875, HMS Challenger recorded a depth of 26,850 ft at the Mariana Trench with a weighted rope. How much did the rope weigh, how did they wind it back and how did they know to look in this location?
IT WAS found by accident by a ship designed to make such a discovery.
In 1872, the naval steam corvette hMS Challenger set off around the world on a four-year scientific voyage of exploration. The voyage was led by chief scientist Charles Wyville Thomson under the captaincy of George Nares with the aim to study ‘everything about the sea’.
Challenger was a three-masted, squarerigged sailing ship of 2,300 tons displacement with an auxiliary steam engine.
As part of normal operations, she would take soundings using a weighted rope, measure the temperature at that depth, take water samples and dredge up samples from the ocean bed. In 1875, the ship set off on the long voyage from New Guinea to Japan. Despite being blown west of her intended course, she continued to take depth soundings.
On March 23, between the Caroline and Mariana islands, a depth of just over five miles was recorded. The rope was weighted with a 3cwt weight, which took an hour to reach the bottom.
The depth recorded was thought to be inaccurate, so the rope was hauled up and the weight increased to 4cwt. It gave a similar result. The temperature could not be measured because the intense pressure of six tons per square inch had broken the thermometers.
With modern techniques, the deepest part of the Mariana Trench, called the Challenger Deep, has been found to be seven miles. The crescent-shaped trench is 1,500 miles long and 43 miles wide.
It was formed by the collision of two tectonic plates, one being forced under the other.
Though large, the trench is hard to find in an ocean as vast as the Pacific.
Denis Sharp, Littlehampton, W. Sussex.
DeTAILS of the rope used during the expedition are recorded in the Official Report On The Scientific Results Of The Voyage of hMS Challenger, published in 1884. The ship carried 141 miles of rope for sounding and 12.5 miles of piano wire for dredging.
There were two kinds of sounding line: the No. 1 line was 1in in circumference with a breaking strain of 14cwt; and No. 2 was ¾ in in circumference, with a breaking strain of 10cwt. This second line was found to be insufficient for the task. The lines were made of the best Italian hemp, ‘well hackled and rubbed down, to prevent any ragged parts projecting outside and increasing the friction of the cordage during its descent through the water’.
The ropes were in lengths of 120 fathoms, spliced together to form a line of 4,500 fathoms.
No. 1 line’s weight per 100 fathoms was 18lb 9oz in air and 8lb 3oz in water. Thus the weight of the rope in air to achieve 4,500 fathoms was 8,500lb. Some of the rope was doubled to help lift the 3cwt and 4cwt weights over the ship’s side.
The rope was loaded onto sounding reels. Through the 5 in diameter centre was driven an iron rod, which projected at each end to form an axle. extending out from, and firmly fixed to, the ship’s side on the forecastle were iron cranks on which these axles revolved, so the reel could be turned smoothly.
Adrian Jacobsen, Southwold, Suffolk.
QUESTION
Who coined the phrase first among equals?
primus inter pares, the Latin rendition of first among equals, probably originated in Ancient Rome. It was used to describe the consuls who led the Senate in governing the Roman republic.
each year two senators would be elected as consuls to act in a similar role to the Commons Speaker. As all senators were equal, this elevation of two of their number to the consulship made them first among equals.
Following his defeat of Pompey in a civil war fought between the two consuls in AD 48, Julius Caesar was elected as dictator, replacing the consuls as the senior authority in the republic.
After his assassination, Caesar’s adopted son Octavian defeated Mark Anthony at the Battle of Actium in 31 BC and made himself emperor.
The consuls were reinstated in the Senate, but with limits to their power. When they became the puppets of emperors, the position was demeaned.
Today, we use the term to indicate someone who has risen to prominence among their peers, without achieving any formal position of seniority.
Bob Dillon, Edinburgh.
IS THERE a question to which you want to know the answer? Or do you know the answer to a question here? Write to: Charles Legge, Answers To Correspondents, Scottish Daily Mail, 20 Waterloo Street, Glasgow G2 6DB; or email charles.legge@dailymail.co.uk. A selection is published, but we’re unable to enter into individual correspondence. Visit mailplus.co.uk to hear the Answers To Correspondents podcast