What's the difference between clinch and cling?

Clinch


Definition:

  • (v. t.) To hold firmly; to hold fast by grasping or embracing tightly.
  • (v. t.) To set closely together; to close tightly; as, to clinch the teeth or the first.
  • (v. t.) To bend or turn over the point of (something that has been driven through an object), so that it will hold fast; as, to clinch a nail.
  • (v. t.) To make conclusive; to confirm; to establish; as, to clinch an argument.
  • (v. i.) To hold fast; to grasp something firmly; to seize or grasp one another.
  • (n.) The act or process of holding fast; that which serves to hold fast; a grip; a grasp; a clamp; a holdfast; as, to get a good clinch of an antagonist, or of a weapon; to secure anything by a clinch.
  • (n.) A pun.
  • (n.) A hitch or bend by which a rope is made fast to the ring of an anchor, or the breeching of a ship's gun to the ringbolts.

Example Sentences:

  • (1) Turner was at a meeting last month where the Chancellor, Alistair Darling, clinched an agreement with the five biggest UK banks – Barclays, HSBC, Royal Bank of Scotland, Lloyds Banking Group and Standard Chartered – to accept the G20 principles.
  • (2) When you score a hat trick in the first 16 minutes of a World Cup Final with tens of millions of people watching across the world, essentially ending the match and clinching the tournament before most players worked up a sweat or Japan had a chance to throw in the towel, your status as a sports legend is forever secure – and any favorable comparisons thrown your way are deserved.
  • (3) Negative slit smears for AFB from the nodules repeatedly and the histology of one on the skin nodules clinched the diagnosis of multicentric reticulohistiocytosis.
  • (4) Clegg first called for Murdoch to withdraw the bid on Monday, when Cameron had also said he thought Murdoch's priority should be to sort out malpractices in his company rather than trying to clinch what could eventually be a takeover costing roughly $15bn (£9.4bn).
  • (5) The cash-strapped HMV retail chain clinched a deal on Friday to sell its Waterstone's bookshops to the Russian billionaire Alexander Mamut for £53m.
  • (6) The Nevada senator aimed his fire in particular at McConnell, who threw his support behind Trump last week when it became all but certain that the real estate mogul had clinched the nomination.
  • (7) Add to that a dangerous nuclear deal with Iran (as Republicans and Israel’s government see it) and the apparent impotence in the face of Islamic State and the Afghanistan volte-face looks, to political foes at least , like clinching proof of serial failure by the commander-in-chief.
  • (8) It has clinched an association agreement with the European Union, as currently sought by the pro-western leaders who came to power in Ukraine after the removal of Moscow-backed President Viktor Yanukovych .
  • (9) These were supported closely watched by Pope Francis, who personally wrote to both leaders and hosted a crucial secret summit at the Vatican this autumn, which they credited with helping clinch the deal.
  • (10) John McCain took on George W Bush in 2000, before clinching the nomination in 2008.
  • (11) As the talks quickly broke down in Luxembourg, in Brussels, Donald Tusk, the president of the European council, promptly convened an emergency leaders’ summit on Monday evening, putting the onus on both Merkel and Tsipras as the two key leaders to bend towards concessions to clinch a deal.
  • (12) Three tendencies exist at present in the surgical management of lumbar osteochondrosis: orthopedic treatment aimed at stabilizing the vertebral segment (the procedure of choice being anterior total disectomy with vertebral intercorporal spondilodesis), neurosurgical treatment striving to decompress the nervous structures clinched by the disc, osteal growth, scars, and a combined management achieving both of the above purposes.
  • (13) Samaras is also expected to stress the importance of Greece clinching a primary surplus this year, as appears likely, as this will allow the government to offer some relief to lower-income Greeks.
  • (14) Those talks appeared to come close to clinching a historic deal but the talks broke up in early hours of 10 November, amid some acrimony over who was responsible for the failure.
  • (15) However, with the growing likelihood of a contested convention where no candidate receives the 1,237 delegates to clinch the nomination, they have become vital affairs as campaigns claw for every possible delegate.
  • (16) The big surprise is that Ping failed to clinch the 36 votes needed for a second term.
  • (17) With the win, Carolina clinched both the NFC South title as well as the second seed in the conference, giving them a bye week and guaranteeing them home field advantage in their first postseason game.
  • (18) Aston Villa apparently brought at least 20,000 to Highbury on the day they clinched the 1980-81 title, while Manchester City had around 25,000 at St James' Park when they beat Newcastle to win the league in 1967-68.
  • (19) I’m not quite there yet.” In May, after Trump clinched the nomination, Ryan expressed similar ambivalence about the man who won his party’s support, saying: “I’m just not ready to do that at this point.
  • (20) He has also urged Mario Balotelli, who created the last-gasp, championship-clinching winner against Queens Park Rangers on Sunday, and Edin Dzeko, the scorer of the equaliser, to stay at City.

Cling


Definition:

  • (v. i.) To adhere closely; to stick; to hold fast, especially by twining round or embracing; as, the tendril of a vine clings to its support; -- usually followed by to or together.
  • (v. t.) To cause to adhere to, especially by twining round or embracing.
  • (v. t.) To make to dry up or wither.
  • (n.) Adherence; attachment; devotion.

Example Sentences:

  • (1) The first stop in this arid place of poor farms and orchards clinging to the dry soil is Rafah, cut off by the border from its Palestinian counterpart.
  • (2) Feminism sometimes clings too hard to a sense of identity that always equates "female" with "underdog".
  • (3) Everton head to Wembley for the FA Cup semi-final on Saturday but whether Roberto Martínez clings on beyond that game is open to doubt.
  • (4) Their families are said be be distraught at the news and have been clinging to the hope their daughters would want to come home.
  • (5) Her husband, a government official, went straight back to work after being rescued from the roof of the town hall, where he survived by clinging on to the perimeter fence while 70 of his colleagues drowned.
  • (6) It's just Boris being Boris, we say, as if life were just one extended episode of Have I Got News for You Alternatively, there is the scenario remainers cling to.
  • (7) Although it remains unclear why he chose to place the muddled woman in a kitchen – clinging to her mug and surrounded by children's toys – as opposed to say, in a laboratory or a truck, he claims all the words were authentically spoken by "women in dozens of focus groups around the country", prior to being stitched together in this latest triumph for the fashionable, verbatim school of drama.
  • (8) Theresa May signals support for UK-EU membership deal Read more On Dave went, clinging to the inverse principle that the less you have to say, the more time you should spend saying it.
  • (9) Obama said then: They get bitter, they cling to guns or religion or antipathy to people who aren't like them or anti-immigrant sentiment or anti-trade sentiment as a way to explain their frustrations.
  • (10) From time to time I'd bump into Amy she had good banter so we could chat a bit and have a laugh, she was a character but that world was riddled with half-cut, doped-up chancers, I was one of them, even in early recovery I was kept afloat only by clinging to the bodies of strangers so Winehouse, but for her gentle quirks didn't especially register.
  • (11) As I type I can smell the nauseating scent of death that clings to me still.
  • (12) An orderly process of dealing with asylum claims at the earliest point would be infinitely preferable to desperate families laying siege to central European railway stations, risking their lives clinging on to vehicles at Calais or suffocating in vehicles transporting them across borders.
  • (13) Arsenal are clinging to the hope that, like Olivier Giroud, who returned as a goal-scoring substitute in the 2-1 loss to United weeks ahead of schedule after fracturing his tibia in late August, Wilshere could yet surprise people and make a speedy recovery.
  • (14) That Russian meeting appears to have been the key to Milosevic's surrender of power as Ivanov informed him that he would have no support from Moscow if he attempted to cling on.
  • (15) But it may help steer a few more people away from Starbucks in the direction of Costa or one of those small independent coffee shops, book shops, grocers (etc, etc) whom we should cherish while they cling on in the face of unfair competition.
  • (16) The union claims Four Seasons, the UK's second largest care home provider, is also "clinging on by its fingernails".
  • (17) Others are said to be clinging on to the idea that Ukip remains a convenient means of taking votes from the Tories (witness the surreally complacent words of the Labour frontbencher Angela Eagle: “I’m not as worried as some might be about Ukip’s appeal to Labour voters.
  • (18) Hadlow, the controller of BBC2 since 2008 and BBC4 before that, is engaging company with a frustrating tendency to cling to the fence, at least in public.
  • (19) They cling to the realm, or the gods, or love: illusions.
  • (20) The only effect on postnatal development of the central nervous system (CNS) was a small transient change in neuromotor clinging ability of female offspring.