Pikey's Winter League - Willinghurst
An Apology
Before I give a detailed report on this weeks piscatorial activities, I need to make an apology to Jeff Dickinson (aka The Man in Black) as after he won Round 3 of my Winter League, I apparently wrote on here that the match was won by Jeff Simmons ! For anyone who has seen Simmons fish, you will know that this was clearly a typing error as he is unlikely to ever win anything !
Anyway, as regular readers will know, I started my new job on Monday which meant that I had to work a five day week for the first time in about 5 years so there was no Wednesday match for me. However, to be fair, as only 6 anglers turned up for our usual match and it fished crap anyway then I wasn't too upset !
Sunday saw me back at Willinghurst for Round 4 of my Winter League and with Smiffy drawing for us, we couldn't go wrong........except this time he drew us probably the worst set of pegs in the draw ! Looking down the sheet, I was off to Horseshoe 1, a peg I'd never fished before but one I still fancied for a few fish.
To cut a long story short, the lake, that is full of F1's and carp fished like a drain with John Radford next to me catching the only carp - 3 F1's and a proper carp for 15-2-0. The other weights were all made up of roach with Terry Harrison winning the lake with 15-8-0.
I fished a couple of lines with small pieces of catfood, corn and pellett and when I was still biteless with three hours to go, even tried maggott just to catch a fish but couldn't catch on that either. So, I finally ended the match with my first blank of the season !
Teamwise, I knew that Ross had struggled on Oaktree and Paul Taylor had only caught a few roach, so with my blank, I was expecting us to be in the bottom two or so. Fortunately, as the boards came back they revealed that Smiffy had won Old Lake (and the match) with 63-12-0 and Swanny was 2nd on Pittance with 33lb giving us a much needed 15 pts to add to the 3 each scored by Ross and Paul.
Result
Mark Smith......................Over The Hill.......Old 1............63-12-0
Mick "Wicket" Keeper....Foxy Five............New 10.........41-14-0
Donald Garnish................Foxy Five............Pittance 10...35-0-0
John Swann......................Over The Hill......Pittance 1.....33-2-0
Dave Bacon......................Foxy Five.............Old 11...........32-2-0
Teams On The Day
Foxy Five................................32 Pts
Willinghurst Muppetts..........26 pts
Decca........................................25 pts
Over The Hill..........................21 pts
Down The Edge......................21 pts
Molesey...................................21 pts
Willinghurst Cabin.................18 pts
Bookie Bashers.......................10 pts
League
Over The Hill.......................11 pts
Foxy Five.............................11 pts
Down The Edge.................. 12 pts
Molesey................................16 pts
Decca.....................................16 pts
Willinghurst Cabin...............20 pts
Willinghurst Muppetts.......23 pts
Bookie Bashers...................28 pts
So, although I had a disaster (even losing a pound to Plummers who only had one carp), the team remains top with 2 rounds to go and I just hope we don't lose our 3 stars (Smiffy, Swanny and Paul Taylor) for the next round as they may have to go and fish elsewhere.
It's work for me on Wednesday so I'll have to wait for next weeks return trip to Back Arun for my next outing, which following our maiden trip in the wind and rain, I'm really looking forward to.
