With the weather finally beginning to warm up, I booked a couple of Tuesdays off work so I could go and fish the midweek matches at Revels. Typically after a gorgeous weekend, it was going to be a windy one today. After a Greggs brekkie, I got to the venue early and the carpark soon started filling up with the usual suspects.
Draw time arrived and I was gutted to hear the 18 anglers would be spread over Main and Trendles, there are some decent tench and chub in the latter but lots of small carp mean it’s difficult to target the silvers. So I needed Dean to pull out a good peg on Main for me, he normally does me proud but so far this year, his drawing arm leaves a lot to be desired (33 on Trendles and 16 which is one of the best carp pegs on Main!).
I was near the top of the list and he delved into the bucket and grabbed a ball, when he looked and grimaced, I thought I’d be headed up the hill to Trendles but he’d actually drawn me number 12, a great carp swim and in my opinion, the worst silvers peg on Main! Darren ‘Duffers’ fared little better as he was on 14 to my right although he was a bit more optimistic after framing on 15 recently and the obligatory side bet was placed.
It’s a narrow peg and only around 2ft deep (or should that be 2ft shallow!) all over the swim, I’ve only ever drawn it once before and had a torrid time hooking carp and only managed a couple of pounds of small fish. Rather worryingly, there were some ominous big black shapes swimming around and I was already fearing the worst!
I set up my usual 0.2 gram Bobbies to fish two lines at 10 metres straight out and angled to the right, plus at 11.5 metres to the left in open water and a 0.3 gram F1 Carbon Slim for top kit to hand. The side tray contained maggots, disco pinkies and some Bait-Tech Special G F1 Dark.
The all in was shouted and I fed all my lines with a small amount of loose groundbait and a few pinkies before starting on the top kit line. I was expecting to catch quickly but it was slow going and after half an hour, I only had ten little fish. The second thirty minutes was better with another twenty fish (mostly small perch and gudgeon) but when I hooked three carp in quick succession (two foulhooked), I was thinking about having a look on the longer lines.
Next chuck the float buried and on the strike I could see it was a decent skimmer around 8oz so I stuck with it a bit longer but only added a couple more tiny fish before moving out to 10 metres. Again it took a while to get a bite but I started getting the odd skimmer swapping between the two lines but with it being so shallow, I could only get a couple of fish before having to move.
My target for today was 100 fish which I felt would give me double figures and hopefully enough to frame but after a couple of hours I was already off the pace. The wind was being a real pain and blowing from left to right, then vice versa and at times straight in your chops (at one stage it even blew my hat off!). My first look at 11.5 metres to the left resulted in a few fish but I kept having to rotate lines to keep bites coming and carp were becoming more and more of a problem.
I did have a lovely non-counting crucian around 12oz and then hooked a fish that tore off which I initially thought was a carp but then it stopped and I shipped back carefully only for a roach around 8oz to come to the top hooked in the dorsal fin!
Although I was getting the odd fish, it was now obvious I was going to fall well short of my target and my bad run looked set to continue. Dropping back in on the top kit line, a chunky 4oz perch was encouraging but then yet another carp took off up the inside and snagged me solid and despite my best efforts I lost the lot so that was the end of that.
For the remainder of the match I kept swapping lines to finish with 79 fish, which averaging an ounce and a half would give me 7.5lb but I had lots of small perch, rudd and gudgeon so probably a bit less. Darren walked up to see how I’d done and said he’d had 92 fish for around 6lb so I was sure he’d beaten me. We would be nearly last to weigh so when the scales approached, I walked up to see how it had fished, Terry Dell was leading with 49lb 3oz from peg 39 on Trendles and the best silvers so far was Andy Miller (Trendles peg 30) with 6lb 9oz.
Terry Dell had 49lb 3oz on Trendles*
I weighed my half a dozen carp and a crucian for 14lb 11oz and then my silvers went 6lb 13oz which put me in the lead but I didn’t think it would last long. When Duffers pulled his net out, it was going to be close and the digital display settled on 6lb 4oz – phew! I started to think I might sneak in the frame although there were still a few pegs to weigh, Mike on 16 had 5lb 1oz of carp and silvers, Neil Saxby had 36lb 11oz (which included 3lb 9oz of silvers), Roy W didn’t weigh and then Paul Wyatt on 21 (who was admitting to 3lb) had 6lb 3oz of silvers. Thanks to Revels for the photos*
I had 79 fish (skimmers, roach, perch, rudd and gudgeon) for 6lb 13oz*
Duffers continued his great run of results to finish third in the silvers with 6lb 4oz*
Steve Sudworth was second overall with 48lb 14oz from peg 4 on Main*
Steve Crowford was third with 47lb 6oz from peg 9*
John Bass had 39lb 15oz on peg 33 (Trendles)*
1 – Terry Dell (Revels) – 49lb 3oz
2 – Steve Sudworth (Revels) – 48lb 14oz
3 – Steve Crowford (Revels) – 47lb 6oz
Silvers
1 – Jamie Rich (Against Men and Fish) – 6lb 13oz
2 – Andy Miller (Revels) – 6lb 9oz
3 – Darren Duffield (Ilminster) – 6lb 4oz
I was well chuffed to win the silvers and had a nice £40 pick up, it’s always a very close frame with less than 2lb separating the top three and just 10oz between the four best silvers weights. Part of what makes it so intriguing is that both the overall and silvers are always keenly contested and sometimes things like carp anglers on the better silvers pegs and vice versa can go in your favour.
A pound from Duffers was added to the Nugget-O-Meter which is now at £202.
There’s still a great offer running if you fancy treating yourself to some new fishing gear, use the exclusive discount code AgainstMenandFish10 to get 10% off when you shop online at Somerset Angling
Also I still have copies of my book available from eBay here or Amazon here
And if you could spare five minutes to leave a nice review on Amazon, it would be very much appreciated.
Next up – Todber Manor
Coming soon – Lots more match reports
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