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If it’s the bottom one you’re missing, my post @16 might help

Sorry, I don’t have the puzzle to hand. I’ll reply in 45 mins when I’m at home and can read it, if someone else hasn’t

Ahhh, I think I see what you mean. I rather ignored that, because it was so badly written. I don’t think there are any additional entries, so for “a” I would read “any”. I thought it meant that, in the final grid, nine of the words in the upper row started in that row, while the clued words started lower down, even though the clues are in the correct order. It’s essential to decide which final words are meant, in order to show the correct bars. The final entry for the “Tesla” clue becomes eight letters and two words

I meant to say that “nine of the words in the upper row started in that row, while six of the clued words started lower down

Oh, I see! I was looking for some hidden final message. Odd to have finished the puzzle anyway without understanding that paragraph. Thank you, Quisling.

I could be wrong, of course. No doubt Drxx or Muraria will enlighten us. I have enjoyed the recent IQ series (it runs the Listener close), but I think John Henderson has a very light touch as an editor when it comes to preambles, and occasionally it shows

I agree with your interpretation of the endgame, quisling but I had no trouble with the 3rd paragraph, in fact I found it quite helpful.
However, I had an exchange (at the other place, quite early on) with someone who also felt it was confusing. I used a specific example as an illustration, which I've subsequently edited out, but I'm sure you'll know what I was getting at.

Q - I don't understand the third paragraph. the preamble is poorly written, imho.

(Me) The 3rd paragraph explains why some clues are to be entered starting with an empty cell (**** becomes a longer answer later on, but its space within the grid starts inside one of the initially empty blocks - so it's a 5 letter space for a 4 letter word to begin with - in this way it maintains symmetry).

Q - But its symmetrical entry would be *****, which isn't in Chambers, or do I misunderstand you?

(Me) - ***** is a given name and is one of the new entries.
By the way, the name is in Chambers (fem of '****').

That’s interesting, and helpful. Much clearer than my ham-fisted attempt to explain what I meant, so thank you for that. It’s clear you understood the third paragraph better than others

To be honest, I parked the third para. until it became clear that one of the initial entries, the "German city" was in a different place in the final grid order, meaning that there were six longer entries before it on the top row.
Also, guessing that 1 down contained the starting letters of 2, 4 and 7 across helped massively

Well. my grid fill isn't going very well - just two words entered with zero confidence. Is there any hope of doing this without understanding where the three blocks of cells are and how many cells they take up? Because I haven't got a clue what the blocks of cells are all about?