The 800 Quiz

Answer: Arsene Wenger

In August 1996, Arsenal sacked manager Bruce Rioch, who had been in charge for a single season. At the time, Vice-Chairman David Dein had built a working relationship with Arsene Wenger, the former manager of AS Monaco, who was then employed as the manager of Japanese club Nagoya Grampus Eight. Dein had sought to hire Wenger the previous season, but had been rebuffed by the board. Following Rioch's dismissal, they were more receptive to the idea, and Wenger was unveiled as Arsenal's manager on 22 September 1996. During his time at Arsenal, Wenger won the Premier League title three times, including the famous "Invincibles", which saw the team unbeaten in the league during the whole of the 2003-04 season, as well as seven FA Cups. Wenger's 800th Premier League match in charge of Arsenal came on 28 October 2017 with a 2-1 win over Swansea City.

Answer: Christmas Day

Charlemagne, also known as Charles I or Charles the Great, was born in 748, the eldest son of Pepin the Short, King of the Franks. Charlemagne succeeded his father in 768, and subsequently became King of the Lombards in 774. In 799, Pope Leo III came under attack by supporters of his predecessor, Adrian I, and fled to the protection of Charlemagne in the city of Paderborn.

In November 800, Charlemagne and the pope returned to Rome, where Charlemagne convened a synod, or council, to discuss the problems that were affecting the church.

In an effort to restore his position, during the Christmas mass on 25 December, while Charlemagne knelt at the altar in prayer, Pope Leo crowned him as "Imperator Romanorum" or Emperor of the Romans. This saw the establishment of the Western Roman Empire, which eventually came to be known as the Holy Roman Empire. Charlemagne's reign lasted until his death in 814.

Answer: Kyushu

The 800 Series was a new type of Shinkansen rolling stock procured by JR Kyushu, the main rail operator on the island of Kyushu, to operate services on the then new Kyushu Shinkansen line. JR Kyushu originally ordered a total of six 6-car sets from Hitachi that entered service in March 2004 on Tsubame services on the newly opened first section between Yatsushiro and Kagoshima.

In 2009, the company ordered a further three sets to enter service upon the completion of the line's second section to Hakata. One 800 series train was written off in 2018 following damage it received in the 2016 Kumamoto earthquakes.

Answer: Soviet Union

By 1980, Sebastian Coe and Steve Ovett were regarded as the world's best middle-distance runners, with Coe holding the World Record for the 800 metres, and Ovett gaining the records for both the 1500m and mile just prior to the start of the Olympic Games.

This led to the pair having an intense and sometimes bitter rivalry. Coe was the favourite for the 800 metres, regarded as his best event, but, going into the home straight in the final, Ovett led with Coe in fourth place. Although Coe was able to pass Agberto Guimarães of Brazil and Nikolay Kirov of the Soviet Union, he was unable to catch Ovett, who won in 1:45.4.

However, six days later, the result was reversed when Coe won gold in the 1500 metres, for which Ovett was seen as the favourite, with Ovett winning bronze. Nikolay Kirov went on to win a silver medal in the 1500 metres at the 1982 European Championships behind British athlete Steve Cram.

Answer: Atari

The Atari 800 was developed as part of Atari's 8-bit home computer series, alongside the smaller Atari 400, which were originally released in 1979. The names given to the machines referred to the amount of memory they had, with the 800 having a total of 8kb of RAM.

The 8-bit series was the first home computer to be designed with a coprocessor chip, a device that functions to supplement the primary CPU in the unit, allowing the Atari to have more advanced graphics and sound than its contemporary rivals.

The Atari 800 also featured two slots for cartridges, and the capacity for its memory to be upgraded to up to 48kb. The 8-bit series as a whole sold 4 million units by the time production was ended in 1992.

Answer: Matt Smith

On 1 June 2013, three weeks after the broadcast of the final episode of his third series in the role, Matt Smith announced that he would be leaving "Doctor Who" at the end of the year, following the broadcast of the 50th anniversary and Christmas specials.

The 2013 Christmas episode, entitled "The Time of the Doctor", which was also the 800th individual broadcast episode of "Doctor Who", wove together a large number of plot points that had been woven into the series narrative during Smith's tenure in the lead role before introducing the series' new lead actor, Peter Capaldi.

Answer: Waterloo & City

In 1993, British Rail began accepting delivery of a new fleet of trains to operate the Waterloo & City line. These new trains, identical to the new rolling stock being delivered for operation on London Underground's Central Line, were to replace stock that had originally entered service in 1940, and was now life expired.

The delivery of the new trains was an opportunity to close the line for a period to undertake track and signalling work - the line closed on 28 May 1993, with the final withdrawal of the old trains, and a replacement bus service, using route number 800 began operating over the route between Waterloo and Bank stations.

The line was reopened with the new trains on 19 July 1993.

Answer: Model 101

Within the narrative of the "Terminator" franchise, the humanoid infiltration units called Terminators all have a Series number, which refers to the underlying endoskeleton, and which is standard, and a Model number, which refers to the outer appearance.

As a result, Series 800 Model 101 Terminators, as seen in the films "The Terminator" and "Terminator 2: Judgement Day", would all have the same outer appearance (i.e. that of Arnold Schwarzenegger). The full nomenclature is shown in a scene in "Terminator 2: Judgement Day", when the Terminator is rebooting itself - the start screen, which we see in a point of view shot of the Terminator's Head-Up Display, states that this particular Terminator is a "Cyberdyne Systems Series 800 Model 101 Version 2.4".

Answer: Muttiah Muralitharan

Muttiah Muralitharan made his test match debut for Sri Lanka in a test match against Australia starting on 28 August 1992. In the match, he took three wickets for 141 runs, with Craig McDermott his first victim. Murali played in test cricket for Sri Lanka for 18 years, with his final test match coming in July 2010 against India, in which Pragyan Ojha became his 800th and final test wicket, which he took with his final delivery in test cricket. Murali twice claimed the world record for test match wickets; in May 2004, he took his 520th wicket, overtaking the record of West Indian fast bowler Courtney Walsh, only to have his then record of 532 eclipsed by Australian Shane Warne in October of the same year. Warne eventually retired with 708 wickets, which Murali passed in December 2007.

Answer: Crystal Palace

Johnny Byrne made his debut for Crystal Palace at the age of 17 in October 1956, while the club was in the Third Division South. He soon became a regular in the first team, as well as becoming a regular goalscorer. In the 1960-61 season, which saw the club win promotion from the Fourth to the Third Division, Byrne scored 30 goals.

His form led to recognition from the Football Association selectors, when he was called into the England squad in November 1961 for the British Home Championship game against Northern Ireland at Wembley Stadium. Upon his call-up, he was only the third post-war player to win an England cap playing for a club outside the top two divisions of English football.

In March 1962, Byrne left Crystal Palace to join First Division West Ham for £65,000. Byrne eventually played a total of 11 games for England, scoring eight times, including a hat-trick in a 4-3 win against Portugal in Lisbon in March 1964.