I nearly didn't write this weekends Blog as I am still depressed after sundays events and don't even want to talk about fishing at the moment. I appreciate that there are far more important things happening in the world then the result of my fishing matches but sometimes it doesn't seem like it !
I was so looking forward to the Leatherhead DAS match at Plantation Lake at Stub Pond as I think that of the 4 matches we had there last year, I won three of them with some great big weights, fishing paste down the middle, and it also made a change to fish somewhere other than Willinghurst !
After a hearty breakfast at Bury Hill Fisheries on the way, we arrived to that with 15 anglers present, and with about 34 pegs on the right hand bank available, we could spread everyone out and all have a bit of room - which is the one thing you need on Plantation Lake. Not really worried where I drew, in went the lucky right hand and out came Peg 59 which as it wasn't an end Peg - which were the only ones I really wanted, I didn't think it would make much difference.
However, that was before I glanced down the draw sheet and noticed that whilst some of the pegs had 1, 2, or even 3 empty pegs either side, Pegs 58,59,60 and 61 were all in and I knew straight away that I was going to struggle.Arriving at my peg, I was even more depressed to find that I didn't really have an edge peg either as the rushes stuck out either side and I couldn't see down the edge either side at all. Nevertheless, I still had a match to fish and although I should probably have set up a waggler and lead to fish across, you can see from the picture that there is a gap in the island on my far bank and I just knew that every fish I hooked would try and swim through it ! Not only that, but I had caught enough fish on the pole in the past to know that if it fished ok, I could still win it fishing paste down the middle.
I started the match fishing paste down the middle at about 11.5 metres and having fed a couple of pots of hemp and some paste I soon had the peg fizzing. However, the fish were skimmers and roach and although I did catch one carp early on (hooked firmly in the left hand - as I think it was picking up the bait to put in it's mouth) after a couple of hours I'd still not caught any of it's mates and the skimmer bites were getting worse and worse. Although I had heard that a few anglers further up were catching a few fish, nobody around me was so I wasn't too worried as I still expected to catch later on.
No matter what I did I couldn't get away from the skimmers or roach like these and finished the match with 2 carp, a few skimmers and a couple of roach for 16-8-0, beating only two anglers, Phil "The Tapper" to my right and Geoff Simmons to my left (who I did give a pound to as he had 5 carp but did not weigh in).
To make matters worse Plummers drew yet another flier and I surrendered with 20 minutes still to go and with Tony netting his 13th carp I ventured along the bank and gave him his pound.
ResultRoss Nursey...........125-0-0
Terry Harrison......120-0-0 (see Picture)
Paul Taylor..............89-0-0
Mark Lindsey.........88-0-0
Nick Kenward.........79-0-0
I've just about recovered from Sunday now and am looking forward to wednesday's "Any Method" match at Willinghurst and it will be interesting to see how well the "Floater Boys" do.
Come back Thursday to see how I get on.
