SWS/Haines Angling, Sedges 8th July 2018

It was due to be Durleigh on Sunday for the match that runs alongside the Silvers' Final at the venue, but I thought it was full as space was limited so managed to book into the SWS/Haines league match at Sedges as a stand-in.

I got to a rather full car park in plenty of time for the draw and said a few hi's and hello's to some before loading the trolley and waiting to crack on with the draw.
I wanted to be on Tile rather than my favoured Brick, just, if anything, to see if I can amend my 'clicking' after the numptiness of my last visit.

I paid my pools and waited in the queue for my turn to nab a ball from the basket, I got in after Mark Leader and pulled my favourite peg on the complex, peg 8, I was happy enough as it is a consistent area. For company I had Chris Haines on peg 7. Peg 10 wasn't drawn so I fancied whoever was on 9 to do well for sure.
There were loads of fish all over the lakes before the match began, they sort of vanished as expected with the commotion but a few remained as all of us were expecting a good day's sport.

I set up method feeder (not used), a pellet wag, a shallow pellet rig using my standard DT 0.1g Pinger. A silvers rig for 11m, a meat rig for 2+2 and a paste rig for over my shallow line around 16m out. Also an edge rig which remained unused.
Bait sorted, mostly 6 and 8mm pellets and meat but I had casters, dead reds and some paste. Mixed up some groundbait too.

Brick peg 8

It was bloody hot and expected to be over 30 degrees, lovely.
At the all in I started by feeding the various areas of my peg and started in the wag for 10 mins, nothing forthcoming. So on to the silvers line, 2 bites, 2 foul hooked carp, enough of that, I did not expect the skimmers to play ball in the sun and heat so I threw my silvers bait away just to save myself from picking it up again.
Out on the shallow pellet rig, a few slaps and nothing so I tried paste (I don't do paste and I seriously need to practice it to be fair). A couple missed 'bites' before I managed my 1 and only fish on this rig, a 5lber to finish off the opening hour.

The next 4.5hrs was pretty much hard going with just the odd fish getting caught all round. Actually I was doing ok up to a couple hours from the all out when I began to lose interest and my efforts all but vanished, maybe it was the heat and sun along with Chris on peg 7 doing well for most of the day fishing a simple pellet wag match, he had defo had the most on Brick Lake. I just couldn't get anything to work consistently, it would be a single fish here and a single fish there either on the wag or shallow on the pole.
My final 2hrs gave me the square root of nothing. My clickers were on 60lb and 6lb which was 9 fish and 1 fish respectively.
I reckoned Chris had around 125lb, so a decent tally for him,

At the all out I packed up then had a chat with a few guys, Brick had been hard and Tile had not fished as expected and a few struggled.
I loaded the car and managed to catch up with the scales that were working their way along the causeway pegs.
It was soon my turn and I managed to keep my clicking close with a total of 68lb.
I saw Chris weigh and he had 124lb 8oz and probably won the lake.
Tile fished hard-ish and Mark Leader had 106lb which included the top silvers on the day of only 12lb (7lb was 2nd best), maybe I should have fished for silvers, lol.
Someone had 108lb in a net and therefore fell fate to losing that net and his weight ended up as 2lb or so, unlucky.
On Brick we got down to Dave White on peg one, he said he had 13 carp, I guessed around 80lb for that. Well he totalled 73lb, so 1 fish ahead of me. There was a 19lb and 17lb carp weighed in the match too which boosted a couple guy's weights on the day.
The pegs 21 to 30 had been hard and Steve Martin was best with 91lb from that bank.

I waited around for the giving of monies and was happy enough to get my money back with a default 2nd in section behind Chris and Dave. I was 6th-ish overall on the day. Not so bad.
I really should have chucked the feeder out a couple of times for sure, but that's hindsight, maybe I should have set a depth pellet rig up, but I didn't and to be fair I never saw many guys catch in the deck during the day. I should have, however, put more effort in during that last 2hrs, I would have picked up at least another place, but unlikely to have caught 125lb.

RESULTS:

1st, Chris Haines. 124lb Brick peg 7
2nd, Mark Leader. 106lb (top silvers also at 12lb) Tile peg 35 or 36 (I think)

Section 1 Brick pegs 1-10
David White. 73lb
Lee Williams. 68lb

Section 2 Tile pegs 31-40
Nigel Reeves. 77lb
Jamie Smith. 67lb

Section 3 Tile pegs 21-30
Steve Martin. 91lb
Steve Musitano.  68lb

No idea where I am this weekend.
So until next time take care
Lee