Hillview

Up to Tewkesbury to hillview fishery for this philtone sponsored match, it has a team's of 7 format with myself, Craig edmunds and professional dobber Martin rayet As team captains, the teams were drawn behind closed doors up in the philtone printers board room, ok so it was the kitchen, list below.

Some names you may recognise and some you wont,
the breakfast at the fishery was very nice to be fair , so I will give it a 4.4, nice and hot and quickly served, thanks clint.
niel for the draw sorted and I did out teams , and I found myself on peg 81, which today was one out of the corner on the third canal, it looked good but I was told by several people who have fished it recently that it was the wrong end of the canal,  it you never know, and I am normally fairly positive as to how I fish, so we would see, Martin rayet had drawn it the day before and had 80lb+ off it, mainly dobbing bread across to the far side, into a small bay off to the right,

So I set up a rig for that, also it looked good up towards the end bank to my right, with lots of overhanging dead foliage, so I set up the dobbing rig which would also do for the end bank,

 I felt the meat would be a good net today so I set up a rig for the left hand margin where it a nice three foot deep,

For company I had Clint wojtyla to my left, and Tim Ford behind me on canal two, so good banter , Tim managed to turn up with no hooks or rigs, he had done some the night before(keener) but had forgotten to put the drawer back in his box, luckily his captain Martin rayet and Clint next door sorted him out with a few bits to get him goung.
It was an interesting match with getting a few small carp on dobbed bread early doors but it wasn't going to well to be honest looking around it seemed a few people were catching steadily,  but both myself and Clint were struggling, Tim behind had plenty of carp swimming around on the surface, but as is normal on this venue, can be tricky to tempt,  but Tim was getting odd ones. I caught nothing to my right amongst the foliage, I was getting occasional fish from the far bank, I had to wait till the last two hours before I got any sense from the swim, I had a good burst down the track on maggot, but it didn't last, but I started catching fish down the left hand side on meat, most people had stopped catching by now, except for trig Edmunds and niel Mercer who were next to each other in the middle of canal one, so I felt i was clawing some ground back on those who had caught in the first half of the match, I didn't want the match to end as I felt.my.margin was getting stronger, at.The end I felt I may have 60lb, , I was last but one to weigh and was a bit surprised to have a level 80lb called. and as expected trig was top with over 130lb

with his boss niel second on the next peg with 89lb, my first net went 39lb and the other went 41lb so 80lb in total, which was good enough for third , and to top it off my team came.out on top, so a good day then , sheet below.

a big thanks and well done  to Niel and Phil mercer.for arranging it and sponsoring it, it was a good day with plenty of bites for most.
And lastly Judith and me hope you all have a happy ,prosperous and healthy new year,