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The theme of this year's dinner was Elite Athletes and Internationalists. The dinner held this theme because this year the School has had 16 Internationalists in six different sports, and to recognise this achievement we presented for the first time the 'Stewart Crerar Quaich for International Sporting Achievement'. This new award was accepted by the Headmaster from Stewart and his Grandfather, JS Crerar, who attended Merchiston between 1927 and 1932 and is reputed to be one of the oldest living Merchistonians at the age of 95. Allister Hogg and Simon Webster, from Edinburgh and Scottish Rugby, brought with them the Calcutta Cup. Many of the boys enjoyed seeing it and had some pictures taken with the players before moving to dinner. We also had on display our 11 trophies that leading teams have won this year in 6 sports. These have been dominated by our success on the rugby field this year.
The evening ended with the presentation of the Crerar Quaich for international Sporting achievement. There were three nominees: Russell Weir has been captain of our successful Cup XV and Vice Captain of the XV; he played for the Edinburgh Integrated side and started two matches against Italy and France and came off the bench on three other occasions.
Sam Hughes joined Merchiston at the start of the year and has made a huge impact on the School, both on and off the rugby field. He was very consistent for the XV and was instrumental in our cup success against Dundee High, George Heriot's and George Watson's. He was selected for the Scotland U18 team and started three matches against Italy, France and England and came off the bench against England A, Ireland and Wales. His reports from Scottish Rugby have been outstanding as he made a huge contribution to the team's success. The winner for the Crerar Quaich for International Sporting Achievement was Sam Hughes. A great evening was concluded by a vote of thanks and presentation of gifts to Allister and Simon by our Captain of School Bruce Mustard.
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On Friday night a Dinner was held to acknowledge the success of all our sports at Merchiston and this year the dinner was graced with 110 boys who have represented Merchiston at first team level in seventeen sports, and twenty staff and guests. 
Mr Charman defined an 'Elite Athlete' before dinner and identifed the challenges such young athletes have when going through their school years and the support that they need, trying to aspire to be the best in their sport. Allister and Simon continued the theme after dinner in their presentations. Allister explained the path he took from attending Stirling High School through to gaining a professional contract with Edinburgh Rugby in 2003. He himself was identified by the Scottish Institute of Sport as an Elite Athlete and he gained support in developing as a professional rugby player. Simon gave a full account of his training week at Club and International level, identifying the highs and lows of training, from heavy contact sessions, to ice baths and video analysis sessions.
Stewart Crerar joined Merchiston in Pringle where he already had national and International success in the Road to Wimbledon Competition and in the Four Nations Event. He played 1st team tennis at the age of 14 and reached the semi-final of the Independent Schools Tennis Championships at Eton. This year he again represented the victorious Scottish team in the four nations event in Ireland and gained a Junior ITF World ranking. He also made his Sky Sports debut when he reached the La Manga International event at the end of 2007.
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