Cadbury Angling Silverfish Open Match 1 of 4 Plantations Main Lake

Thankfully the lake had defrosted, wind changed direction and the temperature was on the up, all positive signs for the match ahead.

17 anglers booked in and were looking forward to one of the first silverfish only matches held on this venue.

Breakfast was at Acorn Fishery and was top notch as always.

I took the last peg in the bag, peg 12, a pretty useful silvers peg.

Steve Mayo was to my left in peg 11.

Carp showed up in a few pegs early on and not many silvers, not what I was hoping for! I could see Lewis Walker on peg 19, catching skimmers steadily and sure enough Steve starting getting a few bites too, from carp initially.

I had a slow first hour but I knew the skimmers responded well to large amounts of groundbait so I wasn't scared to keep feed going in, even when I hadn't seen much action from my first 3 balls going in at the start.

My shorter line only produced 1 carp so I pursued my two longer groundbait lines, bites came slow and steady with a burst of activity later on in the match. Steve caught impressively throughout the match on maggot over groundbait, which seemed to be the preferred tactic from most anglers on the day.

Word from around the lake was that Paul Faiers on peg 27 was also catching well, most of his fish came on the waggler, proper silverfish fishing!!!

From my peg, I couldn't see many other anglers catching well, but with Callum Dicks in my section I didn't hold out much hope for a pick up.

After calling all out it was obvious to me that Steve had won, the results are as follows:

1st Steve Mayo    Peg 11    23lb 7oz
2nd Paul Faiers     Peg 27   16lb 6oz
3rd Callum Dicks  Peg 7     16lb 3oz

Section Winners:

Toby Parker         Peg 12    12lb 8oz
Rich Lovering      Peg 26      8lb 1oz

Steve's impressive winning bag

Paul's 2nd place net of fish.