The sport of kings: Mornington Crescent

[ComeIntoTheGardenMaud]

Good morning, all. What better way to begin the long weekend than a new game of the ineffable Mornington Crescent? All are welcome - veterans and newbies alike.

To set the tone, I will start with one of my favourite moves - a double shunt to

Kew Gardens

In which case, to avoid lowering the tone,

Highgate.

Do you see what I did there?

Using the Northern Heights rule, Edgware.

Oh, good play all round overnight.
Mile End, with an eye to the Grenson Rule.

I take the three turns first exception clause and move to Stepney Green. Good job the 1961 rules conference added it in.

Yes, 1961 has gone down in history hasn't it? Mostly for the rules changes, but also in small part, if one is to believe what the old-timers say, due to the dowager and the housekeeper not, let's say, seeing eye to eye on the accommodation arrangements.
Bank

Well the dowager was always more…flexible, regarding accommodation arrangements.

Personally, I do think the Polo Captain should have had a bed at least. Yes, he loves his ponies, doesn’t mean he wants to sleep with them. Straw is fetching in a farm boy, less so on uniform.

Hampstead

I always felt the Polo Captain rather enjoyed the stables arrangements. Allowed him to play the rustic in a slightly Lawrentian way.

Angel (using the Burlington Harbinger).

I feel, having read both the Tatler and the court transcripts, that the least said about the Polo Captain’s more Lawrentian moments, the better.

Highbury and Islington

I make no comment about moments.

Blackhorse Road

Indeed.
Can I get away with an Outsider, if I use up my fractal points?
Let's see.
Brixton

I will discreetly deploy the Schlegel riposte so beloved of the Forensic Accountant.
Parson's Green.

I love a bit of greenery, myself. A swoop along the central curve of the rainbow to Green Park.

Oxford Circus I think…

I’m sensing a verdant theme, so

Turnham Green

So sorry to bulldoze, as it were, the trees and shrubs, but I can see us drifting towards an angled imperative, which considering the ratios in play would be catastrophic.
I'm going to have to say Tooting Bec

You’re right to be cautious, LittleBitofBread. Angled Imperatives on Sundays can have disastrous consequences, as the principal bassoonist learnt to her cost in Fife.

Kennington

Yes. Pity; she'd had a good run until then.
Whitechapel as eastbound is in the ascendant.

I'll use the Monday Forward Convention to Bromley by Bow

Oh, good move!
A Manchester topspin to Warren Street

Ooh a Manchester is risky! But you pulled it off with your usual skill and aplomb!

The topspin drive us inexorably to Cannon Street. But you already knew that!

Hey ho!

Euston Square

It's off to Maida Vale we go.

Thank you, Muse, you are kind.

Farringdon, bifurcated.

Waterloo. I know. But think about it.

You see what I mean?

Well done, TragicMuse. You've cleared the blockage and so extricated us from that awkward lateral dislocation.

Warren Street