The main idea of the match was to raise funds for research into gastrointestinal cancer at the University of East Anglia following John Platton’s recovery from major surgery 3 years ago. It was a brilliant weekend with fantastic fishing and well over £3,000 raised for the charity.

Saturday on the N&DAA waters on the R.Bure and Sunday on the Gt Yarmouth AA stretch of the R. Yare with points being awarded for sections of 9. There were 54 entrants and the overall winner was Tommy Bolton, one time tackle dealer and exile from Essex. Fished for Essex County years ago. Tom had a perfect 2 section wins weighing in over 20lb on both days. He certainly didn’t have the largest weight on either day or overall. Lewis Murawski and Chris Jakubowski (those poles can’t half fish ~shh) both had a first and a second in sections but Lewis made second place on weight and Jacko third.

To be honest I cannot remember yesterdays results other than the winning weight was 45lb 13oz and that was caught by Robert Hubbard. I had skimmers all day yesterday but they were not very large for 17lb odd. There were loads of 20lb weights including 2 in my section of 9 so I was 3rd in the section.

I do have the results for today though, with the Boards being the section where most of the bigger bream were and I was luckily enough to be drawn. 3 of the top 5 came from there. But every section was won with over 20lb. The river is still very coloured and there was 10.5 inches registered on my colourometer.

1st Chris Jakubowski, peg 66 maybe 67 with 34lb 15oz
2nd Tony Anderson, peg 61 with 33lb 14oz
3rd Andy Moss, with 31lb 13oz
4th Kevin Paynter with 31lb 9oz
5th Will Freeman peg 64 with 30lb 5oz

The best pole weight that I heard of Dave Reeve with over 22lb of roach in the 20’s all the other weights were bream and skimmers.

On the Boards the lead changed 2 or 3 times during the match as far as I could see. Andy Wilson Sutter was admitting to 12lb after 45 minutes and 20lb after and hour and a half. I suspect that after 2 hours at high water I was in the with 23lb but both Andy and my pegs dried up with Andy weighing 22lb something and me with 27lb 4oz whilst Jacko kept catching. Tony Anderson had 3 large fish in the last half hour for another 10lb and if there had been another 1/2 hour of the match may have had a few more.

Anyway, a brilliant weekend, I have had 45lb of bream and skimmers in 2 days and am totally worn out!

There were a number of sponsors including
Eurolink Marketing Services
Angling Direct
Cordy’s Fishing tackle
Lathams Fishing tackle
Lewis Anglers World
The Beauchamp Arms who provided refreshments after the Yare match and donated £150
Preston Innovations via Will Freeman
and many others.