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Following last years’
outstanding performance good things were expected from
this years squad. The venue was the River Nene around
Wellingborough, so not too far to travel. This was also the
first National since the radical changes, that were being
trialled, had been introduced. These changes included a random
section draw that meant no one team had all the end pegs,
section draws were made three weeks prior to the day allowing
anglers to know in advance which section they were to fish. In
some sections cars not coaches were used to get to the
sections. Much of the excitement of the draw was lost with it
being virtually unimportant, the other main let down was the
fact that the bookie was only taking section bets, everyone
likes to have a flutter on themselves at a National with the
dream of winning £8-£10,000 a reality to one person each
match.
As we
arrived for the draw at Wicksteed Park the heavens opened in
true summer fashion, the car park threatened to turn into a
complete quagmire but fortunately the rain stopped before the
cars were due to leave for the river. Once at the pegs most of
the squad were faced with a similar situation, a rising river
with little colour and a lot of weed . Some of the weed had
been cut, but only to just below the surface making fishing
very tricky indeed.
Returning
to the HQ after the weigh-in it became apparent that we had
not equaled last years’ performance, but with all the team
catching it was no disaster. Notable performances came from
Stewart Arrowsmith, who was second in his section with three
fish for3.13kg, Cliff Myers took second best points with 63
from H section, his 1.21kg could have been far more if he
could have landed on of the ten or so pike that grabbed small
fish as he was landing them. Other notable performances were
Stan Kiddles’ 59 points from A section and Ash Adams 51 from
J section.
The
results were finally announced after a couple of computer
“glitches”. The team finally ended up in 53rd. position
out of 88 teams, unfortunately due to the re-organisation of
the divisions for next year the number of relegations was high
and we were relegated. We were only two places and seventeen
points away from safety, still looking on the bright side next
years event is on the Basingstoke Canal which is more local,
and easier to practice, than the Stainforth & Keadby
Canal.
All the team members would
like to express their thanks to Dave Cragg who acted as our
steward for the day.
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For the full
results visit the NFA Results pages
here
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