Gary's day

The last pre Xmas match had us at Home Farm's small lake today. It had not been fishing well recently and we feared the worst. I was surprised to see it was pretty much at its normal level and was very coloured.

It was peg 7 for me today, pretty much in the middle of the far bank and a bit hemmed in by pegs 6 and 8. I really wanted peg 1 which Rob was in as the carp seem to be down that end at the moment.

The match started better than our last visit with most people getting a few bites off roach early on. A try on expanders and corn for carp was a waste of time so I swapped to maggots to get something in the net.

The first 90 mins flew by the odd roach coming out but they just did not seem to settle. You caught a couple and then they disappeared.

After a quiet spell the float went under and it was not a roach. After a brief fight the rig came back with a large scale on the hook - foulhooker no. 1. Another 30 mins with a couple of roach and this time when the float went under with a carp it made it to the net.

If the match ended then it would have been job done. Sadly not and Rob then started catching whilst we all looked on.

Darren on peg 6 and Fred on peg 5 were having a good run of small roach with lots of splashing through most of the afternoon.

A few nice roach and 1 more foulhooked carp towards the end was my day done.

There was only going to be the one winner today with Rob wiping the rest of us out with 7 carp for 32lbs. My carp made all the difference giving me second place with Darren putting a good net of roach on the scales for just over 7lbs and 3rd. Photo today is Fred with his bag of roach.