A couple of weeks ago I was contacted by Mike Nicholls who asked me if I could stand in for him on this match. As I hadn't been to the venue for a while and I was free on that date I was happy to help Mike out. I had a decent week back in fitness training and managed two spin classes, HIT and a bodypump class, I even managed to play an hour of football on Friday afternoon. Footy really was the limit for me, and later that evening I was very slow getting out of the chair and feeling quite stiff. Still no pain no gain as they say, and I walked to the doctors Saturday to get my second Covid Jab, did some gardening to as the weather was conducive.
Got up Sunday morning and had a stiff left shoulder, felt a but dehydrated and a slight headache, hmmm thought I only had a couple of cans last night. Off to pick up Glenn Bailey as we travelled together for the first time, having the van made loading the gear pretty easy but I do need to think about the best way. Driving down the headache I had was getting worse and I felt a general stiffness, as we got to the fishery I was wishing I had some tablets, and then it dawned on me, it was the side affects of the jab I was feeling. Sedges is another fishery that provides keepnets and landing nets that must be used, the net limit is 100lb, but you are only allowed to take 2 nets to your peg, and if you need another you have to go and get it. 100lb limit is generous and not one that should cause any issues if you aim for 80lb I guess.
I paid my pools to Tony and chatted to a number of anglers I hadn't seen for a while, as ever this league draws some very good anglers. I managed to pull out a peg on Brick Lake, peg 8. Wasn't to excited by this one as I feel you need to be right in the corner, 10 and 11 but maybe it could be OK for skimmers. The weather was quite pleasant at this stage, though a little chilly, but there was plenty of rain and strong winds forecast which I was going to take into consideration for tactics. At my peg I looked back down and saw a number of good anglers, I had Shaun Townsend on peg 7 and Mark Jeffries on peg 9, couldn't really see Mark due to a tree in between us. Behind me on Tile was Kev Winstone.
I thought about what to set up, I had contacted a local angler Paul Berry who gave me some info about the lakes and I would take these ideas with me today. Although at this stage I could have fished long I decided to go with a top set plus 3 sections distance (well I was standing in for Mike lol) and here I set up a 4x18 old Preston float with 0.13 powerline to a 16 GPM, felt this was a compromise between carp and skimmers. I set up a 4x16 rig for fishing lighter for silvers if needed, a 4x16 for the LH margin with 0.17 powerline to 16 XSH for meat. I did set up a rig for fishing really short on meat, but I never used this one.
The picture below is looking back down the lake, peg 1 is on the RH corner, the wind was blowing from that end meaning my end was affected much more by it.
Match started at 10:30 and I potted in some corn and 4mm pellets on my long line to the right, potted some in fed lightly to the left. It was a slow start for me, nothing over the LH line, then onto the RH line and after about 10 mins here I had 2 skimmers in 2 drops then nothing. I tried the LH line again and had a bite as soon as the rig settled, it was a carp about 5lb, no more bites here. I was struggling to get any indications, Mark had had a couple of carp on paste, Shaun was still blanking. I tried changing the amounts of fed, and hookbaits either corn or soft pellet to make something happen. I hooked another skimmer and lost 2 carp which were fouled. Shaun then hit a very large fish which swam off and somehow found a snag and he lost it. Soon after he was playing another carp but it was his neighbours fish that had swum into his line lol.
Two and a half into the match I had just two carp and 4 skimmers, but hooked another carp which was my best at about 8lb. Shaun only had 1 skimmer at this stage and was trying the paste now, I happened to look up as he struck and his float never moved for a couple of seconds, then slowly off went another munter. Shaun was soon sat staring at a top set with no rig after his elastic had snapped, ooops! The wind was getting stronger but still OK for me to fish where I was, but I had abandoned the LH line a while back concentrating on the right as the rig was catching an undertow and going right against the wind. I was finding the only way I could get a response was to feed a decent amount of bait in a pot, trouble was if I got a skimmer it was just the one, and if a carp came in they were hard to hook in the mouth. I just kept at it and started to feed some meat in the LH margin.
With a couple of hours to go it was getting harder to hold the pole, and the tow was now changing with the float going with the wind slightly and was to get worse. Shaun had managed a couple of carp on corn, I sneaked one (and my only one) carp out of the margin. I had taken a couple more skimmers but was now fighting a losing battle with the wind. I came into a top set plus one line right in front with the same depth as out longer. I changed the hook length to 0.17 to 16 XSH and began to feed meat here. To begin with the rig sat OK here, but despite this the first 3 carp I hooked here all came off as were fouled. I was though able to get a few more bites here and had a couple of carp and 2 skimmers. The wind was now horrendous and the rig had to be deepened off to lay some line on the deck. It didn't help presentation and I managed to lose a couple more foulers and get another carp out. The match was over, and I had 8 carp and about 10 skimmers, Shaun and Mark both had 5 carp each.
Whilst I packed up in the rain which had been relentless for a couple of hours I watched house martins and swallows flying really close to me as they searched close to the ground and lake for insects, in fact as I stood by the tree by Kev Winstone the birds flew even closer to us, within inches of us at times. It took an absolute age to get weighed in, due to the weigh sheet on our lake getting wet and new paper was required. Whilst waiting Tony Rixon came round assisting the weigh in on Tile lake. He was sporting a very fetching umberella I must say.
This was the last time I got the phone camera out it was just to wet. When the scales arrived I saw Mat Toomes on 10 have about 130lb, Mark on 9 had 5 carp for 43lb. My turn, 16lb of skimmers and 8 carp for 45lb, my carp were small it was remarked, for a total of 61lb. Shaun's 5 carp went 47lb, and with his skimmers I think he had 57lb, so I managed to beat the guys either side of me but not too many others I think. I had no chance to get the results, so I will have to look out for these on Tony's blog. I believe though that the top four would have all come from corner pegs. Silvers was between John Fuidge and Ryan Shipp on Tile I think...
Remember that 100lb net limit, well one angler managed to have 102lb in his net, meaning he lost all of that net, and he weighed in 9lb (3 eels), unlucky Paul Elms lol. The drive home was rather longer than expected due to the rain becoming torrential, you simply couldn't see the white lines on the motorway at times. Really hope this weather turns and we start to get some warmer weather, May really has been pretty awful weather wise.
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