As presenter Amol Rajan declared that the suspense could cause him a heart attack, the Bristol team and their friends - watching together in a local pub - could only agree.

After a stunning campaign which has seen Bristol topple three teams, the talented four faced Darwin College, Cambridge in the second of their quarterfinals.

The teams traded leads but Cambridge edged ahead in the closing minutes of Monday night’s show.

Impressive answers by Bristol on women winners of the Nobel Prize in Physics and the tradition of tea ceremonies pulled them back to 150 apiece. But it was the captain of Darwin College who was fastest to answer the tiebreak question on John Keats’ odes, giving them the victory.

As the teams applauded each other on an incredibly tight match, Mr Rajan said: “I’m going to have a heart attack if you guys keep doing this to me.”

Empathising with the Bristol team, he added: “These are the incredibly tight margins by which things are decided.”

Having now won one quarterfinal and lost another, Bristol will have the chance to compete in a third for a place in the semifinals.

Bristol captain Kevin Flanagan, studying for an Artificial Intelligence PhD, said: “It's been nice seeing support from family and friends and elsewhere. It's good that people seem to be enjoying it, as our main goal going into it was to enjoy it ourselves.

“We've been having watch parties for the episodes in a pub which has been great. You'd swear we were watching a football cup final or something with the atmosphere. People really get into it and cheer on the correct answers.

“Despite the result not going our way, we were glad to have been involved in an entertaining match against great opposition.

“I did feel we had a few unlucky moments in this match but it's all part of the game. Personally, I've been kicking myself for not just going for it on the Poulenc music starter, for example!

“At this stage all the teams are so good, I think any team can beat any other team depending on the set of questions that they get.”

This is Bristol’s first loss of the series, after beating Gonville and Caius College, Cambridge and Exeter by huge margins in the early rounds and the Open University in the first of their quarterfinals.

The Bristol team is made up of

• MSci Biology student Ted Warner
• Medicine student Bridie Rogers
• Artificial Intelligence PhD student Kevin Flanagan (captain)
• Organic Chemistry PhD student Olivia Watts.

The reserve player is MSci Biology student Nathaniel Joyce.