19/01/14 - Viaduct - Spring

Weight - 7lb 7oz
Catch - 32 Roach, 6 Skimmers, 2 Perch, 2 Ruffe, 1 Hybrid, 1 Rudd
Weather - Cold start, bright & clear
Match - Winter League (17th out of 19 - section)

The Viaduct Winter League is the biggest competition in the south west and probably one of the biggest in the UK with 19 teams of 5 anglers. My team was Match Fishing Scene (MFS) with Richard Wyatt (captain), Fred Roberts, Martin Fisher and Mike Walker.

With so many anglers on the venue, everyone wanted a decent draw, or at least avoid the worst pegs. Unfortunately I was handed peg 9 on Spring and no one had a good word to say about it. Being a team match I didn’t feel I could just sit it out for a single carp and besides it’s not something I enjoy.

With the bright clear & flat conditions, I fancied the waggler. So the plan was to fish the waggler with maggot/caster over caster catching what I could and hopefully pick up a carp along the way. At least I was going to have an entertaining day with Tom Thick on p10, Fabio on p11 and Ben Bentley on p8 in the corner.

After feeding my pole lines, the lead & meat was cast out, but with no indications after 25mins it was time to try the waggler. In the meantime Andy Power on p16 already had 2 carp, but most seemed to be struggling, which was hardly a surprise., although Tom was catching (& losing) a few perch from the monk.

The next couple of hours was quite enjoyable catching mostly small roach on the waggler, but very few fish bigger than 2oz, expect for a 1lb hybrid hooked in the tail. I tried increasing the caster feed over the waggler, but the fish starting getting smaller.

The pole over groundbait produced a few small skimmers and in hindsight I could have caught a few more skimmers had I concentrated on it, instead of the waggler, but I had hoped to pull in more fish on the waggler – swings and roundabouts.

I had also fed caster down the right hand margin next to the tree, which produced zero bite. I tried a light maggot rig, a double caster rig and prawn. A big pot of caster late on also failed to produce.

In the last hour it was becoming obvious I needed a carp. I had a couple of casts on the tip with bread or meat, but couldn’t cast to the island, so got as close as possible without taking the piss, but evidently not close enough. With 10mins to go the tip did go round on meat. Happy days,  as I felt a decent fish on the end and Tom’s face was a picture. However as I got the “carp” closer, I realised that perhaps this fish wasn’t as big as I hoped, then a 2.5lb bream popped up – bugger.

The team didn’t do particularly well with Fred (24-10 from p73 for 14pts) & Mike (77-10 from p3 for 17pts) getting the majority of our points. The low numbers on spring opposite the island all caught With Nicky Ewer catching 156lb to win the match.

Campbell next time for me in 2 weeks. Really hope I drew on a few fish, otherwise it will be a case of scratching around for a few silvers.

1^st 158- 7 – Nick Ewers – p5
2^nd 96- 1 – James Knight – p102
3^rd 88- 8 – Peter Bailey – p85
4^th 88- 5 – Luke Sorokin – p66
5^th 87- 6 – Andy Power – p16
6^th 85-14 – Steve Tucker – p77

Silvers
1^st 23-10 – Nick Chedzoy – p38
2^nd 18- 0 – Gary O’Shea – p105
3^rd 17- 8 – Des Shipp – p88