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Well, I absolutely loved this and thought it was full of wit and ingenuity.

1a made me think back to my youth (I played that position for the school team) and as for 25a - who can forget the lovely Ms Bellingham? Also, at 24a, I had to study that dynasty for my school history project on the "Age of Enlightenment".

Like I said, lots of clever and witty clues but I was particularly pleased to get 8d, having missed the "to go" reference in a clue a couple of weeks ago.

I did feel a pang of horror when I saw 19d - it brought back terrible memories of an event that occurred during a lovely summer I spent in Montreal. I was determined to really improve my French, so went to the library to get the French language version of "A La Recherc........." by 19d. I couldn't see it on the shelf so asked the librarian it's whereabouts, in what I thought was pretty impressive French. He looked at me with what can only be described as pure pity, paused, presumably while searching for the most tactful way of saying it, and asked me "are you sure you wouldn't prefer the English language version" - the shame, I'm reddening now just thinking about it :-(

After seeing all the positive comments that last week's puzzle garnered, it was clear that I was just not on the setter's wavelength, but I thoroughly enjoyed this. What did you think?

Oh, and yes, Foxtrot is in there (See last week's thread)

Yes, a lovely grid. 2d, 9d, 20d, 18ac and 25ac all brilliant. Everyman back on form these past weeks.

Loved the phonetics of 12ac!

Yep, thumbs up from me too. I can't quite put my finger on why some are just a slog to do whilst others are a delight but this was in the latter category. I liked the inclusion of three similar(ish) expressions 3d, 10a and 18a. Good stuff!

Hi Simon, hi Richard, I think pretty much everyone would have enjoyed this - hats off to the setter :-)

PS. If you say the answers to 10a, 4d and 18a in that order, they almost form a sentence (sort of) - do you think this was intentional?

Another lovely puzzle, thanks Everyman!
Particularly enjoyed 5ac, 25ac and 8dn ( a penny drop moment for me too Brendan).
Loved 21ac - very witty!
I'll look out 4 these puzzles every week now.

Thanks Brendan - your reference to "to go" helped me parse 8d.

Good to hear from you again Matador, how are things down under?