Here's the last newsquiz of 2019

I hope all you newsquizzers had a lovely Christmas break - while still keeping on top of the news of course. The top solo scorers in last week's quiz were Tom Savage and Alex Richman who both scored 22. Jaymes Bryla scored 19.5, Janet Boyle and Liz Gerard 19 and Toby Brown 18.5. The best team was the bizarrely-named Happy With 39 Points from the @thestagatwalton pub quiz who clocked up a remarkable 24 while out drinking on Friday night. Neil and Jo Benson scored 22, Bruce and Sarah Hayward 21.5, the Roberts Family 20.5 and Adam Batstone and Lucy Thorpe 19. Below is the last newsquiz of 2019. Give it a go and let me know how you get on. I hope you have enjoyed the weekly challenge this year. I will be back with whatever stories 2020 has in store for us. 

The Boxing Day front pages

1. The Queen, in her Christmas Day speech, said: 'The path, of course, is not always smooth, and may at times this year have felt quite ___, but small steps can make a world of difference.’ What is the missing word?

2. Prince Philip left King Edward VII's hospital in London on Christmas Eve after a four-night stay and was flown by helicopter to where?

3. The Duke and Duchess of Sussex missed the Royal family Christmas and celebrated on which island instead?

4. Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn warned that a post-Brexit US trade deal would mean signing up to lower standards including maggots in ____ and rat hairs in ___ ___. What are the two missing foodstuffs? Half a point for each.

5. Ireland’s Prime Minister Leo Varadkar said he had not dismissed Boris Johnson’s idea of building what - but insisted that the UK must pay for it?

6. Prime Minister Boris Johnson helped serve a pre-Christmas lunch of turkey and Yorkshire puddings to 850 British troops stationed in which country?
7. European Commission Vice-President Frans Timmermans wrote a love letter to Britain, expressing his 'deep hurt' over Brexit and concluding with the sentence ‘you will always be welcome to ___ ___’?

What are the two missing words?

8. Which company sacked its chief executive Dennis Muilenburg and put its chairman David Calhoun into the role in an attempt to 'repair relationships with regulators, customers, and all other stakeholders'?

9. At least 12 people were killed and more than 60 injured when a Bek Air passenger jet crashed into a building just after take-off in which country?

10. How did 52-year-old British father Gabriel Diya and his two children die?

11. How many people were sentenced to death in Saudi Arabia for the killing of journalist Jamal Khashoggi?

12. What did six-year-old Florence Widdicombe, from Tooting, south London, discover while writing her Tesco Christmas cards?

13. Who did Liverpool beat 1-0 to become football’s world club champions?

14. What was the name of the typhoon that swept across the central Philippines on Christmas Day claiming at least 28 lives?

15. Barrister Jolyon Maugham was criticised after claiming on Twitter that he killed a fox with a baseball bat in his central London garden while he was wearing what?

16. Why did Tottenham manager Jose Mourinho say, before his side’s Boxing Day victory against Brighton, that his Christmas so far had been ‘very sad’?

17. Swede Flamur Beqiri was shot dead in front of his wife and young child on Christmas Eve just yards from his £1.5million home in which London district?

18. The son of actor Tony Britton, who died age 95 this week, is offering a reward for the return of what which 'went missing’ at Watford General Hospital?

19. Television personality Georgia Toffolo was held in a detention centre in which country after two pages of her passport were found to be missing?

20. All nine Boxing Day Premier League football matches could be watched live via which network?

21. Grammy-winning songwriter Allee Willis, who died age 72, co-wrote the Earth, Wind and Fire hits September and Boogie Wonderland but was best known for which sitcom's theme tune?

22. Who famously described England World Cup scorer Martin Peters, who died age 76, as 'ten years ahead of his time'?

23. Canada’s national public broadcaster CBC upset supporters of President Trump when it deleted a scene, in which he appears, from its Christmas Eve showing of which film? 

24. Who wrote on Instagram: 'Thankfully I know a lot of you will not believe all that you have heard and read following today's court hearing ... thank you for your continued support and love'?

25. What was the most watched TV Christmas special in 12 years, being seen by an average of 11.6million viewers?

Answers here