Only Connect viewers baffled by fiendishly difficult opening question

Only Connect is known for pushing contestants to make connections between clues that appear to have almost nothing in common. But one question left both players and viewers struggling from the very beginning, with some describing it as a “nightmare” to solve.

The puzzle appeared on the BBC quiz show in 2021 and was unusual even by Only Connect standards because it was the first question of the episode. Instead of easing contestants into the game, it immediately presented them with a series of clues in different languages.

A question that left everyone confused

Hosted by Victoria Coren Mitchell, the puzzle began with a sentence written in Russian. Two further clues followed, each presented in another language, while the final clue was in English:

“Quiz which Elaine read this year.”

The seemingly unrelated sentences gave the contestants little indication of what they were supposed to connect. Even the English clue offered no obvious route to the answer.

Neither team was able to identify the connection before Victoria stepped in to explain what the question setter had intended.

The answer was a keyboard question.

The connection was hiding in the keyboard

Each sentence had been constructed so that its words began with letters found across the top row of a keyboard, with the relevant letters changing according to the keyboard layout used for each language.

Victoria explained that the question writer had created sentences using the letters across the top of keyboards in different countries. She also acknowledged that the sentences did not necessarily make perfect sense in their respective languages.

The puzzle was therefore less about translating the clues and more about recognising the pattern behind the first letters.

Viewers called it a “nightmare”

The difficulty of the opening question quickly became a talking point among viewers watching at home.

One viewer wrote that Only Connect was already going to be a “nightmare” after seeing the first question, while another described it as a “brute” and questioned the decision to start the episode with such a difficult puzzle.

A third viewer summed up the confusion with: “International keyboard, are you kidding me?”

The reaction highlighted exactly what makes Only Connect so challenging: a connection can seem almost impossible until the final piece falls into place.

And in this case, the answer was hiding not in the meaning of the sentences, but in the letters sitting at the top of different keyboards.