Guess who's coming to dinner...

[Burgey]

Ok. This weekend you've decided to have a dinner party.

Four excellent courses, fine selection of wines, beers and spirits in the offing.

A couple rules apply though.

You're only allowed 5 guests.

They must all have at least played first-class cricket, and they can be from any era.

For the purposes of the exercise, assume they're all alive and kicking, otherwise the conversation will be somewhat stilted.

Who do you invite, and why? If you're so inclined, tell us what food you'd serve them, and why; what drinks you'd serve them, and why.

If anyone says anything about one of Tendulkar, Lara or Ponting having better table manners than the other, I will ask a mod to close the thread.

For me:

Grace (making sure not a buffet, there'd be nothing left for anyone else)
Spofforth (interesting to see how he'd interact with Grace)
K Miller (a raconteur of the highest order apparently, and one who wouldn't leave the bar til closing)
Tendulkar (for all his runs scored, I really know precious little about him as a person, and it would be interesting to find out)
Sir Frank Worrell (just to shake his hand - what a man he was).

Is heavily biased towards days of yore, not so much because I think those fellas are necessarily more interesting as people than a modern player might be, rather I don't think they'd speak in the cliches many modern players seem obliged to in their dealings with the media.

Not sure on the menu, but there'd be some quality liquor flowing from early on.

Would like to hear some thoughts please, and if it's been done before I really don't care.

[Richard]

Would definately have WG Grace, but 25-year-old one, would be much more interested to meet the fine athlete who no-one remembers than the 50-year-old overweight that everyone does because that was the age he was by the time photography was beginning to be widespread.

Would also almost certainly have someone else from that 19th-century, probably even pre-Grace, though I can't think of any likely candidates. Would want someone from a time when cricket was definately, unquestionably not what we recognise it as today.

Would also like Douglas Jardine, fascinating man however much he might have deplorable about him (same might apply to Arthur Gilligan but I'm sufficiently clued-up on the (de)merits of facism to not want to spend tea discussing it). Couldn't possibly go past my original heroes Graham Gooch and Dominic Cork. The final guest would almost have to be Sir Jack Hobbs, not merely the one who combined influence and excellence in the game as we now recognise it most probably best of anyone who has picked-up bat and\or ball, but one who was always regarded with the utmost warmth by all who knew him.

[Burgey]

Yeah good shouts those. If I had a sixth guest, would have had Jardine I think.

[Goughy]

Larwood
Douglas-Home
Appleyard
Tyson
Boycott

Dont know why especially with two almost teatotalers (who funnily enough dislike each other) but all are people Id like to talk to for differing reasons.

Id have a Sunday roast dinner with drinks after.

[HeathDavisSpeed]

Ambrose
Malcolm Marshall
Player A
Gooch
Garnham

And the meal? Mango.

[silentstriker]

Ambrose would just give you a nasty glare and punch you in the face as soon as he looks at his overdone steak.

I'd pick

WG Grace
Bart King
Thomas Brett
K. S. Ranjitsinhji
Keith Miller


For me, I don't really care how many pushups Ricky Ponting can do or what the net sessions are like for Tendulkar. I want to know something about the times they lived in, how people approached cricket, how they saw themselves and the game, what they think of cricket now, and something about their life which would be alien to us now.

As what's for dinner? Steak. Of course. And beer.

[jeevan]

Arthur Conan Doyle, author of Sherlock Holmes & The lost world (parts of "Up" were ripped off from this, I thought).
Imran Khan for his philantrophy, dont know his politics but he opposes dictators, so it can't be bad. Contender for 'best use of cricketing fame' award.
Sachin Tendulkar, Besides the obvious, his father was a poet and writer, (SRT has read his poetry on a few occasions).
Brijesh Patel Cricketer, cricket administrator, industrialist. (lof of options for this slot, just picked one)
Fifth for standby entertainment, in case this august gathering fails to click. Choice of Sreesanth and a boombox, or Don Bradman to finally settle the question "who'se #2" or even Brett Lee and a guitar.

Food - providing dietary preferences are agreeable: some sort of spicy chicken (even tandoori) with a Gewurztraminer wine.

[Streetwise]

I would only invite two, Harby and Symonds, no food just beer.

On second thoughts maybe have Gavaskar and Ponting along for some mateship.

[Sanz]

Shadid Afridi, I will serve him Cricket Balls
Viv Richards, He will get Ghewing Gums
Ponting and Dravid will get Mints
Zaheer Khan will be thrown Jelly Beans.

[Smudge]

Stephen Fleming, Matthew Hart, Dion Nash and Chris Pringle on one side of the table.

Danny Morrison on the other side.

Drop in the words "Paarl", "dopesmoking" and "snitch" and let things unfold.

[jeevan]

Originally Posted by Sanz

Shadid Afridi, I will serve him Cricket Balls
Viv Richards, He will get Ghewing Gums
Ponting and Dravid will get Mints
Zaheer Khan will be thrown Jelly Beans.

For you, we'll allow you a sixth guest - John Lever.

[SJS]

This is a brilliant idea. I would be completely lost if I was limited to six guests. I suppose the guest list would depend upon what one is trying to get to learn. For the most compelling questions (at least some of them) are ..

1. Who was the greatest (second greatest if you please) batsman ever ?
2. Who was the greatest fast bowler ?
3. Who was the greatest leg spinner ?
4. Who was the greatest finger spinner ?
5. The complete mystery of bodyline bowling which means how difficult was facing it, how was Bradman's handling of it, how great was McCabe's batting and why couldn't he repeat it,
was the fallout of it good for the game or could it have been handled so that the world would have seen a great combat between arguably the greatest batsman and one of the greatest fast bowlers of all time in 1934 instead of the mind numbing batting statistics that Bradman continued to produce? etc.
6. How do the truly brilliant and exciting batsmen (Trumper, Ranji, Sobers, Viv Richards and Barry Richards) over time rank against each other and against Bradman?

and so on..

Of course the list of invitees varies with each question so six guests is never going to be enough (not that an evening is ever going to be enough to pick their brains) but I suppose one still has to make a choice

This requires thinking

[superkingdave]

Brian Statham
George Duckworth
Dave Mohammed
Archie Maclaren
Cyril Washbrook

[biased indian]

will invite

Sachin
Ponting
Lara
warne
murali

will then log in into CW and will show them all the threads that discuss about them

[pasag]

Ponting, Gavaskar, Neil Harvey, Botham and Ian Chappell

All you need is the popcorn and you're set.