The 10th FIPSed World Veterans’ Championships took place on the Kanjiza Canal, Northern Serbia, with a record turnout of 16 teams in a fierce competition for the medals.

Team England ended up a few points off the top three but beaten back to sixth on weight countback.

The scorching weather meant that weights were low across the board and consisted mainly of spiky small catfish, which the mainland European nations were more used to catching. The canal’s carissios (small F1 like carp) and skimmers didn’t play ball on match day, which meant the team had to chop and change tactics.

Top performer from the team was Harry Billings who fished extremely well for his 8pts across the two days. Tactics were two lines at 6m and 11.5m (maximum limit) with bloodworm over leamed groundbait.

Runaway winners were the French team on a miniscule 22 points. The team notched up three section wins on Day 1 and never looked back to finish 20 points clear of the field.

Our thanks to the whole team and Joe Roberts who is integral to getting the team out to countries like Serbia and all of the related organisation. Further thanks to host nation Serbia who put on an excellent match which was both well organised and fair.

Results – Top Six
1 France 22, 26.149
2 Hungary, 42, 19.736
3 Netherlands, 44, 20.731
4 Czech Republic, 46, 18.332
5 Italy 49, 17.846
6 England 49, 17.282