Mathern Mill Friday evening open

 I was away on a training course all week in the classy metropolis of Dudley in the west midlands (yawn fest) and got back in time to go off to Mathern for a Norm Sterry run 4.5 hour open. Weather had been good and there were a few fish showing cruising around. Into the draw bag and out comes peg 8, a fancied peg in the corner with a hay bail at 13 meters to the left that always holds a few lumps.so a rig was set for that line plus a short edge line at 2+1 length. also set up a .4 slim to fish at 11 metres in open water, and a bomb rod to drop in for the many occasions that rig changes would be required. I started by feeding the short edge line heavily with groundbait laced with 4mm`s and corn. it was late in the day and I thought it might be good to get them straight in on that line. Then I went along to the hay bail and had one straight away. After about 10 minutes of it bullying me I managed to fold it up in the landing net and two handed lift it in. it was a beast i recon was in the 15lb + range. I stayed on that line for an hour landing 5 out of 7 and I had 53lb on the clicker. I`ve never had 14-16 elastic put through that punishment before. They are animals that just dot give up. that action didn`t las long and I had a long period when the two edge lines died. even though I hadn`t tried the short line no fish were showing. a go on the long line produced a fish firt drop but it was foul hooked and gave me a torrid time getting it in. A bit later another foul hooker returned a huge scale. Then fish showed up short again but I was foul hooking and loosing them. Back to the hay bail for a while got me two more and my 70lb net limit was close with 6 fish. Switching between the two edge line for the rest of the match got me 5 more before the all out. I guessed on over 100lb by the end. At the wiegh in my 11 fish went 106- 0 and got me second on the night. Norm won from peg 22 with 175-03 of mainly edge caught fish. third was Adam Brown on peg 16 with 102-09, so it was close between second and third. It fished ok but those big lumps I lost cost me a lot of weight as most were over 10lb and virtually unstoppable. full weigh sheet below.