Apologies to H, but Dirk was deffo the best contestant from when H was on (Indeed since then if I ever come across anyone called Dirk - which admittedly is pretty rare - I always want to do THAT chant). Well I did do through a phase of wanting to refer to anyone I met called Stuart as VENTRESS. Or say Tax-free if I met anyone called Harry!!

15 years ago, Pennie bravely turned down £28,000 on a £5k/£75k final pair but ended up with the £5k sadly

£28k seemed like a pretty low offer for that particular era, when it usually would be something more like £35k!

16 years ago today, Linda had a terrible start taking out 3 of the power 5 in the first round (£35k/£75k/£100k) but slowly turned her game around and got to a powerful 5 box where she dealt for a (rather pathetic for the board) offer of £24,000 which proved to be her highest offer but the banker took home the bacon in the end as Linda had the £50k on the table.

Probably the one thing most forumites remember Linda's game for was Noel's little meltdown just before the first offer (7:45-7:57 in this video) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A_71DoO ... isodesinHD

15 years ago was one of my all-time favourite trainwreck games (in a sadistic, schadenfreude kind of way! ), £250 Theresa, who turned down £21,000 (92% of the mean) with only the £75k and £100k above it and sod-all else to back it up at 8-box, as if sounding so sure of herself.....Lo and behold, her whole game crashed and burned in the next 2 rounds and she went away with £250

Honestly, if this game did a re-airing commentary on here, it would be one of the super-rare occasions where i would actually go into full-on Dr Hindsight mode!

I so weirdly and randomly remember something about that Theresa.

She stood in a wing position that was the last one remaining that only saw one gender stand there. Second from last, east wing?? All blokes until that point.

I think the previous two were the 'far post' ends of both wings, men for the west and women on the east. Of course the 'battle of the sexes' (that even I as a revoltingly childish and ignorant 13 year old troll thought was pretty antiquated) later in the year would have rendered it moot anyway.

In March 2007, wing positions E8 and E10 had their first female contestants and at the end of February, E11 had it's first male contestant, "Mystic" Rich, much to the forum's disgust (particularly daniel4389)!! . Ironically, around that time, E7 and W1 also had their first male and female contestants respectively since the post-umbilical era of the show back in 05. To this day I still laugh looking back at how much of an uproar their was on here over this kind of thing

W2 was an weird one, as the first 3 male contestants in the lady-dominated position (Roy, Bernie and Halloween Ben) were only there when the positions got messed up, I.e. Bernie only being there because of "Battle of the sexes", and Roy and Ben most likely being a result of wing disappearances the day before (Joseph/CJ) which otherwise would've had female newbies when they debuted!

24th - 29th April 2006, 16 years ago

'Scouse' Clare was one of what seemed like hundreds of '06 contestants to have a £100k/£250k & scant back-up 8-box, receive a decent offer, decline, wipe the game out. Swear this was mega frequent. I watched the game back recently-ish (probably that OG lockdown) and misremembered how badly she took it. Just a few tears and frustration in reality, I seemed to remember it being an absolute tearbath and a dead atmosphere. She probably didn't give a toss once the credits rolled, let alone back in reality.

Dave E won 1p. Nothing else to say about the game. West Brom 0 - Burnley 0. Notable for being just the 4th guy to win it and thus complete the 'telephone box' moniker for the 1p winners, but if the game happened three years later and he was winner No.25 then it'd be forgotten entirely.

Dot played midweek and her game has mysteriously remained elusive, no online record of it has ever been uploaded and the details are remembered all from the original broadcast. She received a five figure 2nd offer, clearly would've dealt it had it been 3rd offer, wanted to give *us* a game and didn't deal it. The game was wiped out and the regret left a real impression on me. Took a damage control offer of a couple of grand. Her aspirations were modest af and while I can't quite remember them, the five figure offer would've sorted them out. The offer she dealt, not so much.

Richard is probably genuinely most 'famous' for being the guy who replaced Lucy, presenting us with a new face in that 'near post' wing position after two months. I do actually remember him asking the audience if they were ok with an ''early doors'' deal, spooked from the preceding four games (before Clare, James played and won £500). £13,000 was his exit and not too early, 4th offer. Don't remember much else.

Hilary winning £50,000 out of nowhere. Rare and underrated (or perhaps overshadowed) example of what would annoyingly be coined an OHO. The chance to win £50k was there, so that was the end of the matter.

The overshadowing of this came in the form of Massimo's game. I don't need to write too much about this, it's one of the most infamous moments in the show's history. I do, however, suspect he took away the £15,000 that was in his (reshuffled box) as a compo for the game being kicked to pieces. His 2nd offer was £16,000 on a rare 4:10 split in favour of reds. If that was £20k, I reckon he'd have dealt.

I remember during the first lockdown (April/May 2020), I actually saw some of the Season 1 games for the first time.

Claire's game was certainly nowhere near as bad as what everyone on here was making it out to be. I was seriously expecting this horrible show where she was inconsolably upset at the end and the mood in the studio was like a funeral, but she still tried to smile and laugh despite the tears running. Nice girl

Aside from being one of the less depressing 1p wins, perhaps the real star of Dave E's game was his brother Jez in the audience, who constantly lightened the mood with his ultra-optimistic interjections of "That was okay" I also thought it was interesting how Dave got an offer of £1,000 at 5-box where he only had the £10k and literally loose change on the blue side of the board.

But I distinctly remember it being horrifying. Mandela Effect? The fact that the thread backs it up is even stranger. Was it because it was the first time someone had cried over winning a blue?? Possibly?? And this is why it was so amplified in our perceptions? Plenty of flat, crashed games before this but the contestant kept a stoic face, ALA Lucy and the slew of £1 winners in March.

It's such a nothing to look back on, certainly left far in the dust by Bianca and the never to be beaten gold standard of Donna.

And so, we celebrate today's date, April 30th:

2006 - No game on this date as it was a Sunday, just us trying to process all the madness from Massimo's game the day before

2007 - Roy's game peaked at £14,999 at 11-box, then dramatically fell apart during the next few rounds, but ultimately resulted in one of the most hilarious trainwreck games ever, thanks to this little exchange:

Noel: "£49 Roy, Deal or no deal"

Roy: "There's no way I'm joining the 1p club.....DEAL!"

*Roy shakes Edmondo's hand as he deals for for a 49er*

2008: Elaine won £32,000 in one of the extremely rare £30k+ wins during the post-Derek Brown "unlucky era". Unfortunely, this was still written off as a squandered great game and power-5 as she could've had £64k if she went another round and had £50k on the table!

2009: Mel initially dealt at a fairly lacklustre £10k offer at 5-box with the £15k, £20k and £50k. Being left with the £1/£50k at the final 2 boxes, Mel was still unsure about her decision, and so the banker pulled out his infamous draw card - The device then known as the BANKER'S GAMBLE, the first time he'd played this card since his fatal mistake in Alice's game 6 weeks earlier, and sure enough, Mel ACCEPTED the gamble, greeted with audible gasps in the studio!! In the big buildup to the box opening, Mel seemed to think she'd made a mistake as tears started rolling down her cheeks.....and then erupted into a frenzy of happy tears and shrieks of delight after Noel flung open the lid to reveal £50,000!!

2010: The player rounding out April in 2010 was Johnny, one of rather a few contestants to appear on the show with that name. This particular Johnny-boy was known for his broad New Zealand accent and his tearful meltdown when he had to open his box at a serious moment in one of the games he was there!! In terms of his game, he had one of those games that got to a high offer, then crashed, then recovered, only to find out he could've had more if he opened his box. I think he dealt at about £6k or so at 2-box but had the £15k on the table

2011: No game on this date as the weekend shows were on a Sunday in 2011, just 10,000 hangovers were being nursed after the big WillXKate hitch

I can't be bothered typing the whole list but in terms of the other games on this date. In 2012, Craig sold a £20k box for £3k (much to the anger of a certain troll from the switch...), in 2013, Steph dealt at £9k and missed out on a big finish, in 2014, Jason turned a 1p win into a £10k win by purchasing box 23, and Walter had a great game (in contrast to his comedic namesake from 09) and won £33,000

There was no show in 2016, as the show was on it's lengthy hiatus before returning 6 months later for it's official swan-song run

12 years ago, Friday the 13th May, during the Banker's Birthday event, Suzanne had an extraordinary game which resulting in her being the 3rd £250,000 winner!

What a coincidence though. Shame there is no full HQ copy of that episode though. There is one but it's quite choppy and zoomed in (and a few minutes cut).

15 years ago was Lynn's game, where after declining £15k on a 5 blues/£5k/£50k/£250k 8 box, things took a turn for the worst when she lost the £250k and £50k and took it horribly

She took pretty much the average of £1k at 5 box but was inconsolable for the rest of the game even when the proveout went her way!

11 years ago today, Rob who had learning difficulties had one of the saddest games ever, in dealing at £8,000 with only £15k and £250k higher at 8 box, only to have the proveouts go totally against him which he took horribly. And to top it all off, he ended up hyposwapping for the £250k

13 years ago, was a game which co-incidentally uploaded to YouTube today on the very anniversary, Rachael's game!

She got off to a good start, but after the banker taking a comment from Rachel about the opening offer not being enough the wrong way, the banker changed Rachel's initial opening offer from £8,500 to £4!! Despite an equally strong second round from Rachael, this little run-in had set the banker into a mean mood, so inevitably, the banker basically stopped trying to buy the box once Rachael's board started to deteriorate, and she was left with one of the worst finishes to a can you could imagine - 10p or £1....where, in an unexpected comedic twist of irony, Rachel DEALT for the final offer of 17p!!!

I remember watching these games the first time around, I always remembered Rachael being this tall American sitcom-looking broad who always looked stone-faced serious!! But watching her again, she had heaps of funny moments and was an absolute legend when she did!

So here are today's anniversaries for the 8th of July

16 years since Nick M (who was once remembered for having this frightening appearance!!) had an OK game and sold a 10p box for £8,500

15 years since Maria's spectacular £75k win

14 years since Carol took an average deal of £16k at 8-box and squandered £100k, but the forum's reaction to this game (and the 2 games before it) made it sound like Carol's game was one of the worst squanders ever!!

13 years since since Olivia joined the 1p after smiling through a trainwreck game (in the beginning of an era where so many players were winning blues due to the banker giving up trying to buy the box once people's boards started to deteriorate )

12 years since Darren got good offers and had a £20k OPW, though Darren is probably better remembered for posting on here and being quite scathing towards people here swooning over female contestants

11 years since Andy played, forgot what he won (£13k OPW or something?)

10 years since Aaron had a pretty low-budget game but ultimately ended up winning £3,000 out of the box

7 years since the show abruptly went on hiatus for 2 months, at a time were people were becoming convinced that DoND was on it's way out, but Adam had one of the best turnaround games ever on this send-off to the prolonged break, by going from having the worst scenario ever at the second offer - a £15k max game at 14-box!! - to playing to the end and winning just that from his box!

The other games on this date were Alex and Gail in 2013/2014 respectively, but i tend to forget games from those era due to the caution taking over making all of the games blend together......

13 years ago, Martin had one of the most painful trainwrecks ever after the banker took advantage of Martin's utility curve to make derisory offers, and after taking a risky - but NOT reckless - gamble at 2-box to win £35,000, Martin ended up with £1 and was inconsolably upset!

October 2006 was a strange period in the 'peak' year. So many obscure contestants whose games or personalities have not remotely stuck in my memory. Between 'swappy' Barbara and 'traumatic breakdown' Lisa, about two weeks, I barely remember any games or even what certain players looked like. Who the hell was Shell??

The hastily and poorly edited shows that were cut and spliced into a Sunday slot rather than the designated Saturday evening. ''Hello and welcome back to the dream factory.... (cut to extended footage of motionless wingers staring ahead) every game is different, every player is different.... (back to Noel) let's pick our player''.

Harry 'Tax Free' being allowed to use a camera in his game despite it being a clear breach of the confidentiality form. Guessing he was too nice to say no to. Likely he lost the pics anyway after an SD card failure circa 2008.

Jeff being one of only three players in the show's entire history who was a major 'character' and ended up winning £50k+.

Oh just remembered this whilst typing, Noel absolutely banging on and on about the £250k not being on the table. It absolutely dominated games even though it hadn't been away for all *that* long.

A bloke who lived a couple of towns away from me winning £70,000 on the anniversary show. Didn't he find the 1p in the first round to win cash/champagne for everyone? I've seen him around since so I don't think he used the cash to escape (which was just about doable in 2006)

I looked at the Oct 2006 player line-ups and in that mid-month period the only 2 completely drawing blanks were Susannah and Shell, all the rest I do remember!

November on the other hand has more. Karen? Katy? Alan? Peter? Madeleine? David?

Karen and Katy look familiar but can't say what they did. I just know that those names appeared at around that time.

Peter is baffling. I absolutely have no knowledge of him at all.

Alan, ahaha I remember people saying how utterly boring his game was so perversely that's why I remember him. It was a horrible game.

I might have to credit myself for reminding people of David's existence, his game (with adverts to boot) existed on a tape through luck and mercy and it's been on my channel since last year. Very non-descript though.

Yes, it was more about the chanting and everything rather than Nigel himself.