Rob's day

Hi to all

Today we had an interclub match with Abbey Cross at their Hunter's Hall lake near Epping Green. It promised to be a warm sunny day with a fresh breeze blowing towards the car park end. We had a turnout of 7 today with Abbey Cross fielding 8 so one of their weights were discarded. At the draw I was left with peg 17 – apparently 15 and 16 doing the damage on the last match with, I was told, the angler on 17 going home early. You can never believe anything a fisherman says though and at least I was in the right area.

Pegs 15-17 are set out a way in the lake on pontoons, so the water is fairly deep close in – about 8 foot at 11 meters. I started the match at this length on expanders feeding micros and groundbait. After about 30 minutes got the first bite, a bream around 3lb – then a couple more. After an hour I was on 3 fish, John on peg 15 also landing one bream but nothing from Martin next to me on 16. That’s when it all changed – another bite resulted in a bumped fish and they seemed to disappear. Martin then caught a couple on the feeder – then switched to the pole and caught steadily till the end.

Tried the pole at 13m – also short on a variety of baits, also the tip in the middle, but couldn’t get any more bites. Definitely fished better on my bank, with Tony also getting one bream, couldn’t see much being caught on the other bank, just the odd fish, or one or two small roach.

So the match ended with Martin a runaway winner with 29lbs 5oz, myself second with 10lbs 5oz, John Todd third with 3lbs 12oz and Tony Parker 4th 3lbs 8oz
Abbey Cross ran out easy winners 63 points to 32 – thanks to them for hosting us and running the match.
Photo today is Tony, Steve and Ray preparing for the match – thought I would show something different for the picture today, nothing to do with forgetting to take any fishy photos.