英语听力精选进阶版 14204（在线收听）

BBC Learning English 

Words in the N ews   

24 April 2013 

Subbuteo  revival  

Transcript: 

Fingers at the ready! This was the football game of a generation.  

But fans of Subbuteo  gave it the  red card  when computer games arrived on 

the scene.    

Despite this, die-hard fans in Asia have continued to compete and are trying to 

revive this  low-tech game.   

At a recent tournament in Japan, fierce battles were played out on pitches made 

of soft cloth , between devotees who think this game still rules supreme. 

Vocabulary: 

gave it the red card   

a football term used here to mean to reject or to st op using 

die-hard 

determined, dedicated 

low-tech 

simple or unsophisticated  

devotees   

people who are very enthusiastic about a subject or activity 

rules supreme   

is the best and most important  

Exercise: 

Use one of the words or phrases below to complete each of these sentences from 

BBC news reports.   

Note that you may have to change the form of a word to complete the sentence 

correctly.  

red card  / die-hard / low-tech / devotees/  rules supreme 

1. Ultras, the __________ fans of al -Ahly, Egypt's most successful club, took to the 

streets of the capital to show satisfaction after 21 people were sentenced to death 

for their role in last February's football violence. 

2. Angst about government currencies has traditionally sent people flocking to gold, 

and for many _________ of the shiny stuff, gold remains the one and forever 

answer.  

3. Then there is Bologna's world famous ragu, the pasta sauce known in the UK as 

bolognese. This is a city where meat _____________.   

4. Depending on your point of view, Wonga is either an innovative player in the 

world of personal finance  - or should be shown a ________ for wooing people who 

have little chance of meeting repayments into loans with cripplingly high interest 

rates.  

5. Agriculture contributes a mere 3% to the island's gross domestic product (GDP), 

with the rest coming primarily from exports - which explains why farming remains 

relatively  ____________ and many Taiwanese rice  farmers still wander barefoot 

through paddy rice fields.  

Answers: 

1. Ultras, the die-hard fans of al -Ahly, Egypt's most successful club, took to the 

streets of the capital to show satisfaction after 21 people were sentenced to death 

for their role in  last February's football violence.   

2. Angst about government currencies has traditionally sent people flocking to gold, 

and for many  devotees of the shiny stuff, gold remains the one and forever answer. 

3. Then there is Bologna's world famous ragu, the p asta sauce known in the UK as 

bolognese. This is a city where meat  rules supreme.   

4. Depending on your point of view, Wonga is either an innovative  player in the 

world of personal finance  - or should be shown a red card  for wooing people who 

have little chance of meeting repayments into loans with cripplingly high interest 

rates.  

5. Agriculture contributes a mere 3% to the island's gross domestic product (GDP), 

with the rest coming primarily from exports - which explains why farming remains 

relatively  low-tech and many Taiwanese rice farmers still wander barefoot through 

paddy rice fields.