Welcome to a special international edition of Davies Diary. Team Daiwa Scotland competed in 2 major international events this year, the 6 Nations in Wales and the World Championship in Paris, France. The results of both are now well documented however in case you are unaware of the results for Scotland they were disappointing.  However, as with all top events you cannot fail to learn and add to your experience and lots of positives came out of both events.

This year was particularly difficult though as these matches threw up some quite unique fishing styles.  More about Paris in the next episode but if you want to know more about what happened in Wales .... then read on.

We were looking forward to a cracking match in Wales between the 4 home nations, Belgium & France on the newly developed Willow Springs lake complex in Llanelli. We had sneaked in a quick weekend practice about a month before the big day. However, disaster struck the Welsh Federation after the venue was flooded with seawater. This meant a last minute switch of venue to Port Talbot Docks about half an hours drive up the road.

Now this wasn’t your typical venue as you were effectively fishing on a harbour wall, 3 metres up from the water and in 30ft of water .... yes that’s right 30 ft, and at one rod length out too !!!  Picturesque it was not but it was solid with skimmers as well as odd roach and rudd. It took a bit of getting used to I can tell you.  There were a few snaggy pegs and you could lose your rig from the olivette down for no apparent reason.  The Welsh wound us up and had us believing that the problem was Conger Eels or Bass biting the olivette off !?  We were joking all week about getting through the conger to the skimmers !

Practice

We had travelled through the night arriving on Tuesday morning where we used the day to rig up and acclimatise. Team captain, Rab Crossan, had to pick 6 from a seven man squad so the official 3 practice days would not only be crucial to sort out tactics but also to get yourself in the team.

The Welsh lads gave us a few pointers to get us started and it looked like there would be two main methods. Firstly there was the long pole fished to hand at 11 metres (10 metres deep remember) and secondly a big sliding top & bottom float (they called them the 'rocket') on rod and line fished right under the rod tip. The pole was fine but the 'rocket' method was unique. I’d heard about this one before travelling down but you had to see it to believe it. Basically you fish a biggish top and bottom float which slides off a bulk and is stopped by a bead/stop knot in the same way as a traditional slider. But you fish it right under the rod tip or a couple of rod lengths out so no need for casting.

Top and bottom sliders and long pole to hand are not methods we use every week so we spent a day on each to get comfortable before the match. I landed lucky getting an end peg on both days and was happy to be top weight on both days with 5kg+ and 6kg+, things were looking good.

These two days were important as we got to grips with many of the basics. Catches were predominately skimmers caught anywhere between the bottom and six foot off, often holding up your dropper shot or giving lift bites. Groundbait choice was difficult as we looked to get a mix which would get through the depth then break up near the bottom. To be honest we weren’t 100% sure what was happening down there and that definitely didn’t help. I eventually settled on a mix of Sensas Bremes, Lake and River which I stiffened up with PV1 or Grey Leam when necessary. Tackle was robust with 0.14-0.16 mm line, 14-18 hooks and floats of 3-10g.

Day 1

So here is where things get rough and I mean rough. We awoke on match day to a gale force wind and driving rain, not exactly perfect for 11 metres to hand. Indeed some poles were smashed even before the start and the conditions were making even the greats of angling look a tad silly. If I’m honest with myself I was put off by the conditions and it really knocked my confidence early in the match and I had fallen well behind by the midway point. After two hours I had about 2lb of skimmers and the section was being won with double figures.

I lost a few fish when the wind buffeted the pole & rig bumping them off on heavy elastic. It was also difficult to net fish. So I changed down to a softer elastic to give a cushion against the wind and make netting easier, and scaled down my rig to aid presentation. This seemed to get me a few more bites and I decided that with nothing to lose I would go for it and stepped up the feed. I drew a few fish by putting it in softer than initially and began to bag up…why didn’t I do this earlier I thought. I was catching best on bloodworm (2,3 or 4 on the hook) and pinkie and all of a sudden I didn’t even notice the weather.

At the end of the match I was pleased that I’d pulled back finishing with 10lb+ but knew I had run out of time to climb a few section points. As it turned out I was 3oz behind 5^th (next peg) and 3lb behind 3^rd. It was disappointing given that I had really only fished well for 2 hours but that’s life. Local Ace, Spud Murphy won the section with 22lb in what was a really top class performance by a top class angler. Back at the ranch the rest of the team hadn’t done much better and we were last.

Day 2

If day one was wild day two was just ‘stupid!’. The wind was even stronger and it hadn’t stopped raining since Friday night. There was talk of the match being cancelled at one point but most were keen to get it over with. Significantly, torrents of cold dirty water were piling into the dock from the river at the top end of the match length putting the skimmers off. This is where things were to go badly wrong for me.

I was determined to learn my lesson from the day before and attack the venue more. I had also worked most of the night getting tackle sorted and was confident that Sunday would be different. I arrived at my peg to find Belgian legend Luc Vercammen to my left and English star Sean Ashby on my right…pretty tough eh ?? So let’s cut to the chase, Vercammen absolutley slaughtered me weighing in 12lb to my 12oz with Ashby recording just over 3lb. By not adapting to the changed conditions I had got it completely wrong and was like a little boy lost against quality opposition. The softer groundbait, so effective the day before, wasn’t right and the skimmers didn’t respond to an attacking style or positive tackle and they left me for dead.

Big Luc’s style was something of an eye opener. He fished with the pole in the rest, arms folded, simply lifting into fish steadily throughout the match. We had a chat afterwards and he told me he had fished well over depth (50cm) to hold the bloodworm dead still with a light float of 2.5g and fed dark heavy sticky groundbait only when bites faded. It made absolute sense to me afterwards but didn’t make the defeat any easier I can tell you. Since then I’ve been getting slagged weekly about big ‘Luc, No Hands’. Very funny !!!

Elsewhere, there had been a some individual success for Stephen McCaveny who had worked out a method to catch the Rudd when he realised the skimmers would not feed. It was comical because word soon spread of his catch rate and soon we were all doing it but he and a Frenchman nearby fished it better than most. He fed up in the water and had 8lb odd of lovely fish on pinkie/maggot for a section second beating Will Raison off the next peg in the process. The team had performed really well initially and were in the hunt for a long time but fell away towards the end and we finished sixth overall.

France walked away with it in the end and proved too strong for the others. England were runners up with Wales a close third in front of Belgium and Ireland. Individually Spud Murphy again turned in a blistering performance to take the individual title so well done to him, thoroughly deserved.

So, one to forget? Definitely not, there were lots of lessons in there for us all and I include all the teams in that. In the end the best team won. France approached it with an open mind and were prepared to adapt their style to match conditions. It was just great to have been part of it all.

Full results are are available here on the SFCA website.

Part two – the World Championships in Paris - will be here very soon, so check back next week for the next exciting episode of ... Davie's Diary !

Tight Lines

Davie

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