Kelling Sunday 20th November 2011 – J Long Shield and Teams of 5
After a week’s break to allow some club members to fish with the big boys in the SAMF Masters on Orford it was back to our traditional venue of Kelling for the J Long Shield match and 2nd round of the North Norfolk Sea League. As seems to be the norm these days the weather had to play its part with thick fog hampering the trek to North Norfolk from as far afield as Kettering, Ely, Haverhill and even Lowestoft. Well done to all who made it. With a change of key regime at Muckleburgh meeting point and draw was done at the security gate which for once worked well.
The teams event always seems to attract more members to fish and with couple of new members the club was able to field yet another team, namely HSAC CRACK OFFS. Welcome aboard to Paul “sparks” Hudson and Dick “no name yet” Ellis who have joined us from down south. With a sprinkling of individuals from round the corner the turnout was reasonable for a change and the prospect was on for a very tight match.
With the anti-radar lobby in heavy presence it was decided to miss out the whole of the radar stretch leaving 2 sections around the Kelling block house and 2 sections from the end of the radar and under the small cliff. The final section was to the right of the cliff towards the wreck the exact positioning of this being dictated by a party of pleasure anglers. The weeks of South Easterlies had made the sea flat and extremely clear, was this really mid to late November, last year we had snow drifts and sub-zero temperatures at this time. We all knew was that the flatties were there but the prospect of any round fish was low particularly as a monster bull seal was patrolling up and down the near gully.
At the off the damp thick fog came in on cue just to cool down everyone’s enthusiasm and keep any chance of viewing tactics confined to individual sections. With no swell and just ripples of waves locating the fish was the first task. Some opted for a gentle lob others attacked the horizon where they felt more comfortable. For most it was the gentle lob that brought success as the odd dab started to appear but for one or two distance in the odd spot was producing double and treble shots of dabs from the off. Early on as the tide started to flood straight lug or lug tipped with wrigglers seemed to do the business but approaching top of the tide their fancy changed to fish bait tipping. Apart from a quiet period an hour before high water there were fish all the way through although the clever ones had fish after fish throughout the match
With the lack of visibility for a lot of the match each section created its own separate battles. In section A “yoda” Thomas got off to a flier taking a 40 point lead only to see this whittled away first by Alan “chippy” Doy and then by Clyde “end peg” Leggett who went on to take the section. Poor old “red stuff” Randell was becoming more and more frustrated as the fish deserted him, even a lonely mackerel which he lost on the way in. In section C “bassman” Beeton was storming away leaving “inspector” Morse and “gorleston bender” Tovell cogitating on why their identical tactics were not yielding the same results. “silver fox” Neave was also wondering where his usual flattie form had gone as “bass man” was stacking up the points.
In section C it turned out to be a 3 way tussle between “big man” Boyce, Dave “ranger” Shorthouse and “steady” Carter with “no hat” Attew trying to muscle in. In the end it was “ranger” who took the section with, surprisingly, yellow tails at distance. The big boys were fighting it out in section D with “last cast” Watts steaming ahead being followed very closely by Keith “the boss” Morley who eventually reeled him in and took the lead. “big fish” Elliott made a late charge but could not quite over turn “last cast” and “the boss” whilst “sandy coke” Loke was struggling all match to keep up.
The final battle was being had in section E where Paul “jimmy” Carter had actioned out his game by firing 3 baits to the horizon resulting in double and treble shots of dabs almost every cast. Both “moto maint” Conway and Jeff “small hooks” Stannard did their best to keep up but it was no contest. Only rookie Paul “sparks” Hudson on end peg could keep in touch with some quality dabs but poor old “class act” Thorburn who had again lost his mojo was struggling to find any fish with identical tactics.
In the end, the club winner was Mike “last cast” Watts with 6lb 13oz from 30 fish followed by Paul “sparks” Hudson with 5lb 7 1/3oz from 16 fish. Final club podium slot went to Trevor “big fish” Elliott with 6lb 3 2/3oz from 24 fish. Top individual on the day went to Paul Carter with 8lb 5oz from 32 fish followed by Keith Morley with 7lb 7oz from 28 fish and club winner Mike Watts coming third.
On the teams front, Avenue Angling made amends for last match by being the winning team with 8 points followed by a tie for 2nd place between HSAC Rite Gear and HSAC Morston Creek both with 9 points. This left Rite Gear still leading the league on 16 points followed by Avenue Angling and Morston Creek on 17 points.
The 2012 National Sea League Final will be held in North Norfolk on weekend of 20th/21st October. All current teams in the North Norfolk League will be eligible to fish this Final. The requirement for a team to fish this final is that the team fishes at least 4 rounds in a league of at least 4 teams so a new team can still fish the final if it fishes the last 4 rounds of the North Norfolk League. Any team wishing to join the league please contact the club.
This was a very successful match with 380 fish recorded weighing over 95lb and surprisingly all being flat fish and not one round fish. Due to lack of numbers the next match scheduled for the evening of Sunday 27th November at Weybourne has been postponed and will be rearranged for later in the season. Next club match is therefore at Salthouse on Sunday 4th December fishing 9:30 – 2:30.
Club Match Result Top 5
1st Mike Watts 6lb 13oz
2nd Trevor Elliott 6lb 3 2/3oz
3rd Paul Hudson 5lb 7 1/3oz
4th Bill Beeton 4lb 9 1/3oz
5th John Carter 4lb 8 2/3oz
—— … ——
Comments are closed