A TV PRESENTER has revealed why he thinks a university performed so badly on a popular quiz show.

Viewers were left reeling when a team of students from the University of Sussex lost their first-round match on University Challenge with just ten points.

The University of Birmingham stormed to victory with an enormous 245 points.

The Argus: Jeremy Paxman said he thinks Sussex just had 'a bad day on the buzzer'Jeremy Paxman said he thinks Sussex just had 'a bad day on the buzzer'

In the latest episode of the academic quiz show, the Birmingham team returned for their second-round match against Scottish university St Andrews.

At the start of the show, host Jeremy Paxman praised Birmingham on their first-round victory, before saying that the Sussex team simply had “a bad day on the buzzer”.

He said: “It’s fair to say that the team from the University of Birmingham had a little bit of a walk over against the University of Sussex in their first-round match.

“At the gong they had a score of 245 points – the second highest from the first fixtures, while Sussex just had a bad day on the buzzer.”

Team Sussex answered only three questions correctly, including one in the picture round and one in the music round, during which the team correctly identified the song The Beautiful Briny, from the film Bedknobs and Broomsticks.

They could have finished the game with 25 points, but came away with only ten due to wrong answers.

Representing the university on the show were students Natasha Stewart, Spike Asri, Jack Harcourt and Thomas Khan-White.

The team were studying a range of subjects at the university including Geography, Social Anthropology and Medicine.

In March, they beat off competition from more than 150 competitors to make it through to the televised rounds, which were filmed in Manchester earlier this year.

The University of Sussex last won the competition in 1969 when the show was hosted by presenter and author Bamber Gascoigne.

Imperial College London are the current title holders, having beat Corpus Christi Cambridge in last year’s final.

The long-running show has continued filming throughout the pandemic, with contestants separated by Perspex screens and communicating through earpieces to make sure teammates can still hear each other when debating answers.

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