With only three rounds left to this years Fish’O’mania Grand Final at Cudmore the competitors arrived at the Woodlands Lakes at Carlton Miniott, North Yorkshire with high expectations that the fishery would live upto its reputation of high scoring venue.
Though some big name anglers had made the long journey to Woodlands it was Durham angler Tony Robertson fishing in his first ever Fish’O’mania qualifier that took full advantage of his extensive knowledge of the venue to come out the overall winner on the day. A regular competitor at Woodlands, Tony drew peg 11 in the centre of the length on Skylark to finish with 77lb-2oz giving him almost a 20lb lead over his nearest rival Steve Bamford who had drawn on Wagtail.
Tony fed 3pints of 8mm feed pellets to his banded hook pellet to take carp upto 5lb regularly through the match. Speaking after the match, Tony – somewhat shell shocked – said that he was delighted with his draw, having framed in a match from the same area only recently, so as long as the fish got their heads down to feed he was confident about putting in a good performance. Little did he know that his weight would give him a place at this years final. Asked if he would get chance to practice on Cudmore before the big day, he felt that as he didn’t want to get any preconceived ideas about the venue, he’d probably leave that up to the day to make his final chose on tactics. Though as he is taking part in the Angling Trust National championships for Anglers with Disabilities on the 27th of this month at Woodland View, which is not a million miles away from the Grand Final venue, he might have chance to call in to Cudmore for a look around.
Second place was a closely fought contest with Chorley angler Steve Bamford fishing on peg 7 on Wagtail finally winning through with 58lb – 9oz, though upto the final hooter sounding only one good fish would have been needed by the anglers in 3rd, 4th or 5th place to have changed any of the backup places.
3rd place went to Brian Avery, from Newton Aycliffe, on peg 6 on Partridge with
55lb – 6oz
4th place was Greg Norris from Buttershaw Nr Bradford on peg 6 on Wagtail with
54lb – 8oz
5th place was Karl Ebbrell from Denton Nr Manchester on peg 16 also on Wagtail
with 54lb – 3oz.
This is the 16th running of PartyPoker.com Fish ‘O’ Mania. Promoted by Essex-based Matchroom Sport, the event features 16 heats of 130 anglers each with the winner advancing forward to the Grand Final at Cudmore Fisheries, Whitmore near Newcastle-under-Lyme on Saturday 18th July.
The final will be televised live in its five hour entirety on Sky Sports with the eventual winner receiving £25,000. All qualifying events are covered by Sky Sports to be broadcast on their weekly magazine show ‘Tight Lines’, every Friday.
Click on www.total-fishingclub.com – the UK’s No1 online match fishing club – to win a trip to the world match fishing championships, and save money off tackle
