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Four left - 7, 10, 17 and 20 - and by my calculations they must all be pairings. Am trying to get 17 to fit a musical/opera but not succeeding!

7. Synonyms for polish and writer's following abbreviations of Catholic and ambassador.
10. Abbreviation of (location of) Tyneside followed by abbreviation of Henry contained in type of seat.
17. Have solution but not sure of parsing - yes, it is a musical/opera.
20. Ditto - have solution but cannot see parsing.

All pairings, you're on track with 17, American and elected are both two letters.

20 has a (as far as I can work out) superfluous last word which does further define the partner to the inserted answer.

thank you, both - I already worked out the parsing for 17 - ixion's comment should help you, buzzybee. And I agree the last word in 20 seems to be a definition (which we're not supposed to have) ... Quite a tussle this but enjoyable, I thought.

Agree with Ixion - that was also my problem with 20.

Is there an error in 5d.? I would take 'nothing' to indicate an O, not a U.

Isn't 5d one of the normal clues, an anagram of Greyhound without the "sharp bend"?

Nobody has mentioned 29a which has two clues. Presumably the secpmd one can be ignored?

Yes it is, Baretter. My copy, printed early, has
"Greyhound injured ignoring nothing gets gas"
It appears the error must have been corrected, if it later says "sharp bend".

Yep, as seems to be the case rather frequently the puzzle could have done with a bit of proof reading before publication. However, it seems that solvers are sufficiently at the Genius level to overcome these additional hurdles. 😀