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I shamelessly look at this site when stumped and sometimes - as now - when I've finished what seems to me an easy one, to see, from my smug vantage point, how others are finding it. I've logged on because I was struck by how exactly saoralba's points of dissatisfaction matched my own. Could we by any chance be related?

All finished but the only clue I don't understand is 30dn SADDEN. I can see DA but not sure of the rest.

Unclued - the lawmen are DAS (District Attorneys) 'in turn' (= reversed) after subtracting the extra letter I. Add DEN to get the synonym for '(to) cast down'.

Unclued - I assumed - in turn (reversal) of DA's + DEN (retreat)

Thanks both of you - got it now!

I can't make sense f 1d. My answer fits the second word of the clue as a definition- the rest of the clue eludes me.


Apart from that, nice to have a puzzle I could (more or less) do!

Dylan - I also struggled with this. Assume first two words allude to meaning of 'achieve with difficulty' and wordplay routine (boring) less over (o) plus side (cricket)

Interesting to see which clues contributors struggle with. I spent a long time trying to work out which D to remove from "drudges" in 13 across! It had never occurred to me to look at "jaded"!!!

Saoralba is absolutely correct about the definition in 19a, which is plain wrong. I'm surprised it wasn't spotted by the editors, who are usually meticulous about this sort of thing. I think 'left' for reversal is acceptable since the adverbial definition is 'towards the left'.

I couldn't see the point of 'struggling' in 1d. There's nothing in the Chambers definition to support it. There was also an ambiguity in the extra letter since either 'love' or 'over' gives the deduction of O. Trust me to have the wrong one to begin with.

My last niggle is 37a., which could have been an easily recognised AUDI rather than a name that meant absolutely nothing at all to me.

Apart from those complaints I thought the clues were very good.

Dryden - agree re 1D - As said earlier found this to be be the last one to parse with 'The main reference being Chambers' so achievement all that was needed. But see other references ie, Cambridge, Oxford, Colllins etc, all give the definition as 'achieve with difficulty' so guess 'struggling' fits.