Daily Answers

8-across – How to avoid paying for a platypus? : DUCKBILL

9-across – The full measure of Australia : OUNCE

10-across – Kangaroo, say, poetically heard in passage : ISLE

11-across – The Voice of the Highlanders? : SUTHERLAND

12-across – Brit takes headless cat back in to tree-dweller : POSSUM

14-across – Mats laid out in bundles for dancing? : MATILDAS

16-across – Snap up a mixture of northerly 13 : PAPUANS

18-across – Making fast, low sound : MOORING

21-across – Can an airline go wrong internally and make capital? : CANBERRA

23-across – Chunder-making! Quote me! Send it back! : EMETIC

24-across – Did you redecorate : DIDGERIDOO

26-across – Magda you’ll find inside, morning and afternoon, I’d say : GDAY

27-across – Wolf down chow mein with no starter; William drops out : HOEIN

28-across – Ken who served well, or as badly : ROSEWALL

1-down – Sad Aussie detailed to bury digger’s tool inside mountain : SUISYOLA

2-down – Mislaid keys of the cooler : YKSE

3-down – Dr Seuss heartless to, that is, a whiner : EISSOM

4-down – Broken Hill team misses opening: what a record! : ALLTIME

5-down – Man at bay : COVE

6-down – Film star Harris takes out Wilde’s topless Mrs : NNYLFLORRE

7-down – Odds of a French team being seen in Northern Territory’s land : MEHNRA

13-down – Soap he rubs on, GI-style : SRUOBHGIEN

15-down – Cry heard by 28 when not in court? : TUO

17-down – One that 20 made scores of : NUR

19-down – Nationality of a citizen from Western Australia : NAINABLA

20-down – Don underwear? Damn ridiculous! : NAMDARB

22-down – Be quiet and lie back with a bird! : ALIEHS

23-down – Where Cook put a horse to work : EROHSA

25-down – Australian sailors and I find a princess : RANI

26-down – Has Wagga the heart for such a man? : GAWS

1-across – Almost arhythmic songsters : BEATLES

5-across – Arrangement of Bach – one to live with : COHABIT

9-across – Poet’s sea bird circling road by right : LORDBYRON

10-across – Conscious of sun god recoiling in admiration : AWARE

11-across – Try to wound : STAB

12-across – See 4 : HEARTSCLUB

14-across – Cell for nerve gas outside the old city : NEURON

15-across – Earthy sea bird keeping soldiers to the point : TERRENE

16-across – Back legs deliver sharp blow to vegetable : PARSNIP

18-across – See 4 : LONELY

20-across – It’s extremely silly to put axe in the way of a maniac : PSYCHOPATH

21-across – Piece of wood concealing origin of Norwegian pine : LONG

24-across – About to receive sort of poet : RILKE

25-across – Calling up a vet with voice breaking : EVOCATIVE

26-across – Gets limp Buddhist principle in Proverbs : SAYINGS

27-across – Most blue seats left out by model : SADDEST

1-down – Look into loan raised as a lump : BOLUS

2-down – Where to find flight controllers and graduates in a rage : AIRBASE

3-down – Part of ear revealed at topless ball : LOBE

4-down – Upset UN’s applecart: render Help : SERGEANTPEPPERS

5-down – Fruit of aunt’s toil after getting right into dance – well done! : CONGRATULATIONS

6-down – Wilful bird welcomes modern way to gain weight : HEADSTRONG

7-down – It’s not for sight-reading : BRAILLE

8-down – Many in the inner circle quake : TREMBLE

13-down – Product of northern ranch – beef and vegetable : FRENCHBEAN

16-down – Some Treasury papers brought up for writing on : PAPYRUS

17-down – Author’s cut by leading family : ROYALTY

19-down – There’s nothing in the Communist East like a cat : LEONINE

22-down – Welcome cry in the North : GREET

23-down – See 4 : BAND

1-across – Excited men on blown-up toys : BOUNCY

4-across – Dictator demanding endless oil : CASTRO

9-across – Member at dance short of love : LIMB

10-across – Peeling off art to discover woven tapestries : STRIPTEASE

11-across – A heavy burden to have a lock at first, but no key : ATONAL

12-across – Tool didn’t appear to be holding one back : TENONSAW

13-across – Suffering as a commuter : TRAINSICK

15-across – Commanders’ story rejected : AGAS

16-across – Press finds the Guardian in the pub : PUSH

17-across – Shabby article containing Irish oath : THIRDRATE

21-across – More short and broad : STUBBIER

22-across – See 27 : DREAMS

24-across – Kit with 19 to churn churned product : BUTTERMILK

25-across – Shaft appearing enormous in hospital department : AXLE

26-across – Maxim of Chinese philosophy in decline : SAYING

27-across – You should be so lucky when flying or appearing nude in public? : INYOUR

1-down – Those not invited to the top celeb parties to meet the Queen? That’s painful! : BLISTER

2-down – South African port, but not capital like Cape Town perhaps? : URBAN

3-down – See 1 across : CASTLES

5-down – One in Nepal, perhaps, from the mountains : ALPINE

6-down – Child of eleven or twelve : TWEENAGER

7-down – See 16 : ONSEATS

8-down – Design of king or heretic on London’s skyline? : EROTICGHERKIN

14-down – Pint-sized, single, loveless boys with toys struggling to maintain sex appeal : ITSYBITSY

16-down – Get the punters in, as pubs must – no dodgy food : PUTBUMS

18-down – Native American offensively risked being put off reservation, ultimately : REDSKIN

19-down – Dropping glass? : TUMBLER

20-down – Fruit – it’s swallowed by political chum, but not entirely : CITRON

23-down – Goddess hiding in refrigerator : ERATO

1-across – Unelected advisers holding pots and pans : KITCHENCABINET

9-across – 14 down’s too old to love when one has to lay it on thick : IMPASTO

10-across – Pretend muck needs a wash : SHAMPOO

11-across – Israel’s port invites lootin’ : HAIFA

12-across – Son of a bitch in Asia aroused from seeming death : ANABIOSIS

13-across – Crooked deal in salt brings quasi-poverty : BREADLINE

14-across – Drier rivers? : AIRER

15-across – Removed from herb in 20, perhaps : COMFY

17-across – Attempt at order in a nut case will be very expensive : COSTABOMB

20-across – Academic sinecure with terms of study in all exposures : EASYCHAIR

22-across – Cook Island included in the main : CHIEF

23-across – Headpiece of zero volume taking first place : OCCIPUT

24-across – Go : AIRLINE

25-across – Defy demand for coffee – tiny half given : FLYINTHEFACEOF

1-down – One entitled to be king near model with half the tortoises in a watering hole : KNIGHTBACHELOR

2-down – Leading players have alternative to 8 : TOPSIDE

3-down – Careful management initially has America teetotal without Prohibition : HUSBANDRY

4-down – Light on extremes, I become an extremist : NEONAZI

5-down – Soften silver when Susan’s about : ASSUAGE

6-down – Babylonian maybe barely audible in the hierarchy : IRAQI

7-down – Old problem for whistle-blower? : EXPOSER

8-down – Sunday lunch taken by robber Taffie so? Not exactly : ROASTRIBOFBEEF

14-down – Pine for song about golden vehicle : ARAUCARIA

16-down – Show what the cat said to the reaper, as reported : MUSICAL

17-down – Bird turning tail in bed : COALTIT

18-down – Champion on board to come to the top : SURFACE

19-down – Rust means most of 23 is perishing audibly : OXIDISE

21-down – Island for a hundred a month, fifty off : CAPRI

9-across – Back of something backed or put between stones : HORSETAIL

10-across – See you with Kate at the front, socially acceptable : ADIEU

11-across – Trebly oxymoronic politician? : RIGHT

12-across – Holiday kiss quick, but risky : BREAKNECK

13-across – See 16 : SERVICE

14-across – Gone to hospital, one part to show : EXHIBIT

17-across – Legal term gathered by softest option : ESTOP

19-across – Doctor How, certainly no Which Doctor! : WHO

20-across – Girl making Irish boy flip : NADIA

21-across – The meal journalist’s skipped, so becoming? : THINNER

22-across – Girl wanting bloke to embrace mush, non-starter : MAUREEN

24-across – Second choice, another one : SELECTION

26-across – Chinese people in space, round about one : ASIAN

28-across – What’s bad under animal hair, good inside it : MANGE

29-across – See 11 : GENTLEMAN

1-down – God, Lord of the Flies’s William Ing? : THOR

2-down – National Park where end of park game half-hearted : KRUGER

3-down – Writer seemed to think should get extra money, getting pound : FELTTIPPEN

4-down – Shower of rain not popular, black colour of sky misses turn : RABBLE

5-down – One beside oneself when singer accepts backing of Richard : ALTEREGO

6-down – Boy might reportedly follow 8, then 25 26 : MARK

7-down – One with something doing in sore, wet bottom : RIVERBED

8-down – Shocking colour, one for you, the Mohican man : PUNK

13-down – Film alieness? : SHEET

15-down – See 11 : HONOURABLE

16-down – Transport’s oxymoron, improbably nice, arrives on time : TRAIN

18-down – Frivolous menage a trois? : TRIFLING

19-down – Line up pieces for mechanism : WORKINGS

22-down – 1,003 articles for some other time? : MANANA

23-down – Puzzle of trap by English leader spun 180 degrees by another : ENIGMA

24-down – Couple getting to grips with problem, love : SUMO

25-down – Eat cold chop : CHEW

27-down – … a third of which from 10 in 8 : NINE