Rob's day

It was Hall Farm today with another hot day forecast – ten on the match so five on each bank including Matt who joined us for the first time. Left out pegs 26 and 25 today to try and even out the High Bank but the pegs in the 20s still favoured on the High Bank. Out of the bag came 16 for me so was going to be hard to keep up today. With another hot day we again split the match into 2 halves with a mid-match weigh 09:30 – 12:00 and 12:30 – 15:30.

I was mainly going to focus short and in the margins today so just set up rigs for corn and a paste one. Quite a strong wind blowing left to right today and no fish showing (all seemingly up around pegs 1 and 26!) so ruled out shallow. Started short with pellets for just one roach in the first hour so tried closer in with paste. After a couple of missed bites had one carp but no more bites. A few fish in the margins now so a try with corn bought three more carp before the half time whistle. Fish very spooky as usual.

Weights relatively low after the first weigh in although Jeff on peg 2 led the Low Bank with 15-6 and on the High Bank Matt topped the weights with 33-6 to John’s 26-6. My four fish went 13-4.

Onto the second half and more fish were showing in the margins, but not hanging around long and disappearing out of the peg after a quick munch. Paste proved a bit of a disaster (again) with a run of foul hooked and lost fish, so ditched that and just concentrated on groundbait and corn. Fish didn’t really switch on until the last 30 minutes when I had a run of fish to boost my weight up to 59lb.

I knew there were going to be a few better weights further down the High Bank – they also seemed to be catching well on the Low Bank – at one point looked across to see all five playing fish. John Carter came good in the second half from peg 24 (might as well have put pegs 26 in (will do that next time – I wouldn’t have had to put peg 16 in!) ) with a total of 144lb – second Matt with 84lb 7oz from peg 20 (well done Matt for your first match with us).

On the Low Bank predictably Jeff on peg 2 came out top with 51lb 14oz but was pushed close with Peter second with 45lb 12oz from peg 6. So, all caught a few fish in the only on a nice warm day! Today's photo is new boy Matt.