Pub quiz team aggrieved after being banned because they kept winning

Three men who claim they were banned from a pub quiz because they kept winning said they feel "aggrieved". Graham Deaves, 65, said The Horn in St Albans, Hertfordshire, told him he and Norman Hughan, 82, and Nick Mepham, 49, could no longer take part. He said pub staff claimed some people were not doing the quiz any more because "the old guys kept winning". A pub spokesman said it had "asked them to take a break".



The trio, known by their team name Storming Norman, started going to the Monday night quiz last May when the pub they normally went to was being refurbished. Since then, they said, they have missed only one quiz and have won 11 times. Mr Deaves, from Dunstable, Bedfordshire, said when he and his friends, who both live in Luton, Bedfordshire, arrived for one of the quizzes the licensee spoke to them. "He said he had met with people who no longer came to the quiz who told him it was because the old guys keep winning," he said.

"He said 'you're banned from the quiz, my mind's made up and there's no discussion'. We feel aggrieved as we've been banned from the quiz when there could have been a number of other ways of dealing with our success." The owner of The Horn said the team had been winning on a regular basis, attendance had halved and some people were becoming "disgruntled". Adrian Bell said a handicap system had been introduced but the team were still winning. "We told them politely it might be good if they could take a break to let the quiz get up and running again," he said.



"They said this had happened to them before and they were fine about it." At The Horn, winners are rewarded with a first prize of a £40 bar tab, those who come second get a bottle of wine, while those in third place can claim a packet of crisps. However, there is also an extra rollover prize each week made up from the £2 entry fee - the first person to the bar with the written answers to three tricky question wins. Mr Deaves said since the ban in February the team now went to a quiz at the King Harry pub in St Albans, where they had been "made to feel very welcome". "But all we've managed so far is three third places and a second," he said.