Always nice to see a cryptic in the midi contest! One or two indicators I’m not keen on (does 1A use ‘idiot’ as an anagrind?) but some lovely definitions in there and fun wordplay. Great job keeping the surfaces thematic!
Thanks for solving :) (& yes to the question on 1A, I'd seen it before & I preferred it surface-wise to the alternatives I was coming up with, but I agree it's a stretch).
1A: Flag; UNI (“British school”) + anag. (“idiot”) of JOCKAN 7A: Relatively unknown; without STAN (“superfan”) and “endless”, anag. (“doing gymnastics”) of [stan]DSTIL[l] 8A: kicks in the Netherlands?; C[hile] + anag. (“free”) LOS[-in]G (“missing in”) 9A: Club; MACE{-donia] 10A: toward us; [ukrai]NE ARE R[owing] 12A: couldn’t tell you why; NO + I +[roun]D + [t]EA[m] (“gets naked”) 13A: podium; [malay]SIA D[ominates] in reverse 15A: one country; anag. (“gathers”) of “almost the entire” PLANE[t] 16A: competitor from Texas; [l]AST-RO[und] (“boxing” i.e. containing) 17A: a single bumper?; DRY (“unproductive”) (a)round anag. (“broken”) of MADE OR 2D: cutting-edge digital tool?; NAIL (“fix”) + CLIPPER (“sailing boat”) 3D: viewers can watch the Olympics here; even letters from nOnNaTiVe 4D: a novel case; JA (“Germany’s assent”) + [cri]CKET (“after the third”) 5D: musical director; C[eremonies] + anag. (“lousy”) of ARE,RIMSHOT 6D: shot; ESP (“Spain”) + anag. (“wildly”) of SCORES, with C (“ending on epic”) removed (“passing”) 7D: Strong; anag. (“performance”) of BADMINTON without B (“Brazil in the lead”) 11D: turmoil; anag. (“cycling”) of BLAMED 14D: makeup for arena, maybe; [ceremonie]S + A[ct] N[eeds] D[ancers] (“all to start”)
Very impressive to keep the surface so thematic; yes, some stretches resulted, but I can forgive them when they're in the surface to something so bold. Definitely a harder cryptic than usual; your surfaces were so smooth that they made the multi-step clues hard to parse! I'd grab onto a chunk of what I thought you were doing here or there, like [scores wildly] being an anagram in 6D, but then need every crosser to realize you meant ESP for a charade or that [ending on epic] for C was being deleted, or [passing]. (Similarly smooth shenanigans in 8A!) This is not a bad thing!
That said, my favorites were 7A (what a great deletion indicator for -STAN), 12A, 13A, 15A, and 3D. I also love the definition for 17A, but I could feel the surface doing work. I also think 4D has a great definition, but the surface isn't as smooth as some of the others.
As mentioned by JWords already, I don't buy [idiot] as an anagram indicator. It was once recommended to me that I substitute letters for fodder to see if it still made sense; does [B idiot] suggest that the letters in B should be rearranged? I'm not seeing the action of [B wildly] or [cycling B] or [B free] or [B doing gymnastics]. I feel you that no other options seemed good; cryptic constraints are what make writing these so difficult!
Thanks for the kind words, it was a lot of fun to try to make everything fit the theme, though you can definitely tell that some are stretching to get there haha. Agree re: [idiot] as an anagrind, I've seen it before in a cryptic, but I think then it was "idiot [anagrist]" rather than the other way around, which I think is a bit better, though not great. Thinking it over, I think I'd do [Flag brought in by British school jock, an idiotic arrangement (5,4)] instead. I don't like the surface as much, but I think it still makes sense. Thanks again, always appreciate your feedback!
7A: Relatively unknown; without STAN (“superfan”) and “endless”, anag. (“doing gymnastics”) of [stan]DSTIL[l]
8A: kicks in the Netherlands?; C[hile] + anag. (“free”) LOS[-in]G (“missing in”)
9A: Club; MACE{-donia]
10A: toward us; [ukrai]NE ARE R[owing]
12A: couldn’t tell you why; NO + I +[roun]D + [t]EA[m] (“gets naked”)
13A: podium; [malay]SIA D[ominates] in reverse
15A: one country; anag. (“gathers”) of “almost the entire” PLANE[t]
16A: competitor from Texas; [l]AST-RO[und] (“boxing” i.e. containing)
17A: a single bumper?; DRY (“unproductive”) (a)round anag. (“broken”) of MADE OR
2D: cutting-edge digital tool?; NAIL (“fix”) + CLIPPER (“sailing boat”)
3D: viewers can watch the Olympics here; even letters from nOnNaTiVe
4D: a novel case; JA (“Germany’s assent”) + [cri]CKET (“after the third”)
5D: musical director; C[eremonies] + anag. (“lousy”) of ARE,RIMSHOT
6D: shot; ESP (“Spain”) + anag. (“wildly”) of SCORES, with C (“ending on epic”) removed (“passing”)
7D: Strong; anag. (“performance”) of BADMINTON without B (“Brazil in the lead”)
11D: turmoil; anag. (“cycling”) of BLAMED
14D: makeup for arena, maybe; [ceremonie]S + A[ct] N[eeds] D[ancers] (“all to start”)