In a similar vein, once upon a time when I had a 1098, a gudgeon pin clip came out in the oil when doing a service, which left me with a similar dilemma. Surely if a clip was missing, the engine would have already destroyed itself, however - if I didn't check and it was missing…?
Fortunately that piece of work wasn't a case split though.
(as it turned out - all clips were present and correct, and it must therefore have been a "spare" left in the crankcase by the factory…)
