The Angling Trust is pleased to announce both the Veterans and Disabled angling teams selected to fish the FIPSed World Coarse angling championships in Italy this year.

The venue for both competitions will be the river Tiber in the centre of Rome on 8th – 9th August.

England Veterans Team
There will be no change from the squad that fished last year in Bosnia and Herzegovina and those selected are: Dick Clegg (manager), Joe Roberts, Dicky Carr, Roger Marlow, Steve Sanders and Terry Lancaster.  Danny Sixsmith will also be travelling with the squad.

England Veterans Manager Dick Clegg, OBE stated “Last year in Bosnia the venue was extremely difficult and a couple of bad draws each day scuppered the team’s chances of a podium place and finishing in 6th was a huge disappointment for the defending champions.”

“In October 2013 we ran an assessment on the river Trent in Nottingham which was successful in that it allowed me see other anglers who qualified by being the necessary minimum 60 years of age. The quality of those taking part was excellent, but I saw no reason to make any changes to the previous year’s squad.
According to my information the river in Rome will be a huge test and international experience will play a major part.  Bream, carrassio, bleak and the odd carp are expected to be the main species, and depending on the flow floats from 2 gramme up to big flat floats will be used at the limit of 11.5 metres.”

England Disabled Team
The England Disabled team will see one change this year with Bill Galt making his début.  The team will consist of;  John Weeden (manager), Mark Eves, Mick Cove, Alan Chadbone and Bill Galt.  Helpers. Mark Wells, Mick Gibbs , Geoff Lewis, and Tony Troth.

Last year was a disappointment for the team when they finished in 9th place in the World Championship in Bosnia and Herzegovina. The practice gave them a great deal of confidence when they caught more than all the teams around them, but unfortunately on the day of the match it never materialised.  Although it was the same for all competitors,  both the English teams in the Disabled and Veterans matches suffered with the tremendously high day time temperatures. Indeed next years event has been brought forward to early June to try and eliminate the problem faced in 2013.     

Now that the two events are run simultaneously both teams can travel together and stay in the same accommodation. This makes for slightly cheaper costs, but better still it will give a bigger pool of information on practice days leading up to the match.  Last year Mick Cove and Geoff Lewis doubled up as both drivers (taking the equipment over land) and helpers on match days and they will do the same again for this competition. 

The Angling Trust is still looking for sponsorship for both these teams and any donations would be greatly appreciated.