This year's dinner was held on Saturday, November 20 at Kami's restaurant on Hills Road. For the second year running we were provided with a superb selection of Mediterranean food, and the thirty-odd of us even found time to have a little wine as well.
Between tasty morsels of lamb and chicken we found ourselves pondering Geoff's traditional quiz on the season's events. Geoff claimed it was easier than previous years; most of us begged to differ. You can judge for yourself . . .
(To see the answers simply highlight the region below the questions with your mouse by dragging the cursor across the screen with the left button held down.)
Quick singles (one run each)
John Gull, who was subjected to some of the most passionate barracking of the season as he tried bringing some baseball traditions to the most English of sports.
Dave Green achieved this rare feat in a most eventful over that also included several wides and a lot of futile swishing by the batsmen.
Geoff Hales himself finally got to fulfil his life-long ambition when Daniel Mortlock drifted behind square against The Philanderers.
Chris Woolley finally saw no doubt to give the batsman the benefit of.
Finally a question that everyone got: Andy Owen was finally dismissed for 20 after season's scores of 43*, 19*, 70*, 2*, 14*, 24* and 20*.
John Gull, not that he realised this himself.
Oh debut (two runs each)
Chris Martin began his Remnants career with a brutal innings of 79*, but it could have been oh so different if Faruk Kara, substituting for UCLES, hadn't been so obliging by dropping a regulation chance at mid-on.
Poor old Martin Parry suffered these dual indignities: he could feel aggrieved at Steve Tyrrell for shelling the (difficult) chance; but he only has himself to blame for playing all 'round a straight one.
Young Edward Hyde, son of Woozler (and very occasional Remnant) Anthony Hyde, was brought on to bowl at his dad . . . the irony being that Anthony was at the non-striker's end, and the maiden nature of Edward's maiden over meant that father and son never came face to face.
Daniel Mortlock, in his hundredth Remnants appearance, relieved Andy Owen of 'keeping duties in the final over and just about redeemed himself after some initial uncertainties.
Turning for the second (two runs each)
Tony Malik, as many of you know, has a long-standing agreement that i) Geoff will pay his match fee if he makes a half-century and that ii) Tony will give Geoff a banana if he doesn't. In seven appearances this year Tony's top score was, agonisingly, 49 not out; thus he had to pay seven match fees (although no bananas have been forthcoming).
Read that question again -- how can someone win a match by not running the batsman out? What happened was that, on the final ball of our innings, Remnants regular Robin Woolley, 'keeping for The Woozlers, elected not to take the bails off when young Tom Jordan was helplessly stranded half-way up the pitch courtesy of a duff call by his own father. Tom thus made it home, we finished on 128/6 rather than 127/6, and The Woozlers' final total of 127/4 thus saw us run out one-run winners, rather than finishing up with a share of the day's honours.
In our first (not washed out) match of the season Mike Jones returned the best bowling figures, 1/13, and thus found himself atop the club averages . . . but Joe White took 2/22 the next day (in his debut for the club, incidentally) and thus bumped Mike off the top of the pile.
Phil Watson and Rupert Brown pooled their many years of cricketing experience to make 27 in their five overs as we made the best of the fact that The Education Nomads didn't turn up for our July 14 fixture against us.
Mike Scanlon, back in town for Remnants week managed this neat trick, but was instantly forgiven went he sent a nice note (and the coat) back to Cambridge.
Tonk it, boys! (two or more runs each)
Geoff Hales. Umpiring at square leg he stopped an almost certain four by, well, getting in the way, and a rather animated Rob Harvey made the above suggestion.
Russell Woolf, although unfortunately it wasn't some spectacular diving effort on the boundary, but rather a dolly at short mid-wicket (not that similarly simple chances haven't missed on occasion).
No-one . . . well, okay, Daniel Mortlock might have enthused about her rare beauty and warm smile, but ``fell in love'' is over-stating things a tad . . .
John Young was the beneficiary (sorry -- but it was a terrible delivery); Phil Watson was the victim; and it was Les Collings who completed this most bizarre of dismissals.
In a brilliant demonstration of the club's continuity, the silver jubilee match saw Geoff Hales, Anton Garrett, Steve Gull, John Meed, Mike Sneyd and Pete Warner relive the glories of that first, wintry outing a quarter of a century earlier.
Eleven off the last ball (eleven runs . . . no, twelve runs)
First of all there were the six who made up the Remnants side: Paul Jordan; Rupert Brown, Nick Clarke; Chris Martin; Julius Rix and John Young. Then there were four of our number who turned out for Romsey: Andy Owen; Daniel Mortlock, Tom Jordan and Russell Woolf. Finally, Phil Watson and Steve Tyrrell played for Girton (although note that, whilst Geoff Hales, Joe White and Dave Green were all in attendance, none of them actually played in the tournament).
With the last-minute adjustment of the final question 51 points was the perfect score, although the fact that the winning total was just 30/51 lends weight to the general feeling that it was pretty tricky. The winner (given that we all did the quiz individually this year) was John Young, who received a nice copy of Hugh de Selincourt's The Cricket Match, courtesy of G. David's Bookshop, Cambridge.
The other presentation was of a bottle of Champagne to John Gull for, er, the Champagne Moment of the season. One could be forgiven for thinking that it was awarded for his early-season appearance in which he bravely -- or was it stupidly -- played in wet conditions with special non-stick footwear just days after having a cast taken off his recently broken ankle. Not only did he top-score with a brutal 53 not out, but in the process involved himself in two moments -- the ``bat to square leg'' debacle and the 21 runs off one over triumph -- that warranted mentions in the above quiz. However such was the dramatic nature of the ginger one's season that it was actually for his stunning (three-star, in Sal's system) slips catch against The Beehive.
The evening's ``formalities'' were thus almost at an end, and Geoff certainly thought so . . . but then our captain, Dave Williams, rounded out the evening with a quick speech thanking Geoff for yet another year of tireless work ensuring that Remnants CC goes from strength to strength (read dropped catch to inept run out).
