Canterbury quiz team to take on the Eggheads

By Seán McPolin

A local quiz team from Canterbury will appear on the BBC Two show to challenge the Eggheads.

The Canterbury team is called “Hippo’s Hippocampus”, and is made up of John Hippisley, 51, David Anderson, 53,  Walter Bruce, 68, Andrew Whireley, 58, Zoey Richards, 52 and John Richards, 55.

The team fly to Glasgow on Monday to face the Eggheads and record the episode to be aired on BBC Two this year.

The members met via Facebook and their local pub The Old Coach & Horses, Harbledown, where John created the team to defeat the Eggheads. Discussion’s to be on the show had been ongoing for two months, but the quiz team were confirmed on wednesday.

The prize money for the show alternates depending on how many times the Eggheads go unbeaten. For example, if the shows team is two weeks unbeaten the prize money is £2,000 or £15,000 if they’ve gone 15 weeks unbeaten.

The Canterbury team won’t know how much they are playing for until the day of filming, but that hasn’t dampened captain John Hippisley’s hopes, he said:

“[We’re] all chuffed to go, I can only hope we will beat them.

“But is down to the questions on the day and depending on if the eggheads have been beaten before we go on.”

The Hippocampuses’ are not the first team from Canterbury to appear on the show. In 2003, The Unicorn Inn’s team were the first ever team to beat the Eggheads, during the 13th episode of season one.

All six members of the quiz team heading to Glasgow have degrees, including Nuclear Science, Engineering, History and Mathematics, Nuclear Physics and Chemistry and Orthodontics.

When asked about the inventive team name, John said:

“My team is called “Hippo’s Hippocampus” as hippo was my school nickname and the hippocampus is the part of the brain concerned with memory.”