This year, revellers once again turned out in force for the Association of Technology Staffing Companies' annual charity ball.

The event, at the Royal Lancaster Hotel in London on 17 November, saw 600 partygoers doing their best to live up to the Memoirs of a Geisha theme.

The night raised more than £130,000 for the NSPCC, but surely the most memorable aspect of it was the sumo wrestling.

Protagonists dressed up in "sumo suits" to do battle and slap each other about.

Ann Swain, ATSCO's chief executive, assured us that sumo is not one of her favourite pastimes but looked on the bright side: "We didn't have any deaths, which is a good thing."

The Great Gatsby is in the running to be the theme next year. Recruiter anticipates an altogether more sedate evening.