Skills Night At Lord’s, 1 March 2023

The curry had to wait while I doled out a vast number of “valuable” prizes – with thanks to Tony Friend and Chris Bray for the pictures.

Putting me in charge of the real tennis skills night is a bit like putting Boris Johnson in charge of an honesty bar, or Suella Braverman in charge of a kindness campaign.

Anyway, the powers that be have deemed me suited to the task, perhaps in a bid to keep me and my tenuous relationship with tennis skills away from attempting the actual skill trials themselves. In truth I very much enjoy hosting the event.

It has become a twice-yearly thing now – once in the spring and once in the autumn, which makes sense.

While this team of three deploys its skills, you might just make me out, in the distance, badgering the next team to ready themselves

I see no point in repeating my write up for the MCC Newsletter here – you can read it through this link if you are eligible. In the unlikely event that the link doesn’t work for you but you still want to read the report, I have scraped it to here.

I did not go into detail in that match report about the vast number of valuable prizes on offer, but the following pictures might provide some clues.

Brandon appreciates winning the “close but no cigar” award

Fergus scores a cool half-million bucks as the most valuable player

Andrew Hinds presents the coveted Hinds trophy to the lowest-scoring team

The victorious trio celebrate their win

As it happens, Tony Friend’s team was victorious again this time, reprising his famous success in 2016 along with yours truly on that occasion – my first skills night and sole success as a player in the skills tournament.

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