Match Fishing Decline

Another interesting and thought provoking article Mark, thanks.

A glance at the Match pages in the weeklies tells us that there are still some good matches taking place but obviously nothing compared to the massive events of the past, and there is a reasonably equal split between North and South.

However, more and more appear to be on the commercial lakes rather than on Rivers, and it has to be due to the fact that anglers want (need?) to catch bigger and bigger match weights.

I don?t think that match fishing will ever sink into oblivion - after all - one of our most basic human instincts is to be competitive, although the average age of match anglers is definitely on the increase, which is worrying.

Maybe what is needed though is a thorough review of the way the prize and pools monies are divided as it is amazing how often the same names crop up on the results sheets.

I also think that some of the rules need to be revised to outlaw practices like some of the ?stars? who have runners who go to several venues and draw on their behalf, then they report in on the mobile phone so that the ?star? can then decide on where he thinks he has the best chance of winning off of a fancied peg.

When you think about it, match fishing is one of the few sports where everyone starts and competes on (relatively) equal terms inasmuch as we all draw, start and finish together.
I wonder what sort of response would result from the thought of a handicap system?
Most individual sports at competitive level incorporate some sort of handicap system so why not match angling?

If everything stays the same I still hope that maybe there will be a revitilisation of the old style all rounder match circuits as those events have certainly given us some terrific match anglers from Lane to the Ashursts, Gardner, Vincent and Scotthorne.

As far as I see it, the main cause for the decline in match fishing is the availablity of personal transport.

Many anglers today do not want to be told where to fish, what time to start and what time to finish. Many know they will never reach the great skills of the top anglers and the vast amount just want a day's fishing. The keener types join the ranks of the specialist angler, or if they have few skills, decide to become carpers.

At least, with time, they will be able to have a few photos of big fish that will impress their friends, where on an open match circuit they will most likely never achieve anything in a lifetime of angling.

There's an interesting interview with the great John Allerton in this month's Match Fishing. His comments are well worth reading - he considers the main reason for the decline in the number of large open matches is the increased cost of transport/getting to venues, but also mentions the drop in water temperatures on some of the large rivers due to the closure of power stations. He spends much of his time on commercials these days. Interestingly, club angling is enjoying something of a renaissance these days, but relatively few club anglers fish occasional opens in the way that they used to. I've rejoined my club after a few years away and am really enjoying it again.

Personally I don't think we will ever see the sort of matchfishing that took place on the rivers right up to the late 80's early 90's, though of course the numbers had dwindled considerably by then as Mark rightly says.

Apart from the John Smiths qualifiers on the Avon (pole, waggler and stick), and the regular matches around Bewdley on the Severn (mainly feeder, occasionally waggler) there are very few big river matches held anywhere these days, and these are 30 or 40 peggers normally. Twenty years ago there were only one or maybe two BAA river venues where you could fish at weekends, Saturdays or Sundays, even the miles and miles of canal they have were booked solid. Pubs had fishing clubs, factories had clubs, working mens clubs had fishing clubs but they are few and far between now.


For one thing, a helluva lot of anglers havn't got the necessary skills to do it and for another there isn't the interest. Carp match lakes are dominated by a select few who have devoted themselves to learning how to fish a particular venue and the rest are just pool fodder. Most anglers who try to compete soon give up and either go somewhere else or pack up matchfishing altogether.

Peter
I once did a count on the match results for the Angling Star and over 95% of the matches where on commercials and the same percentage for the fish caught. Yes sir let me introduce your user friendly F1 carp plus your user friendly bait pellets of course. Its no wonder Dave Thomas has virtually stopped fishing.I ring Dave up every now and then just to see how he is going on,he does not fish a deal these days due to his back but as he says without the rivers its just not the same

John,

What I find rather strange is that this boom in commercial fisheries is very much an English phenomena.

You hardly find one here in Holland and I don't know of a single one in Norway, Denmark or Sweden either. To my knowledge there are a few in France but then again Belgium and Italy are devoid of them.

Really strange!

I don't understand that John, Dave Thomas was a cracking river angler and theres nothing stopping him fishing the rivers now it just means he doesn't have to weigh in!

Ken Giles is another ex top notch river angler, he spends all his time at Moorlands Farm nowadays catching carp, and he loves it too. He fishes the Starlets over 50 matches as well as the regular opens there, he says he can catch more fish now on pools and doesn't bother with the rivers.

Peter
I honestly think its a quick way to make a name for youself by fishing on commercials.I would rather have 10lb of river roach than 200lb of F1.
When i lived in Australia all carp had to be culled to protect the indigenious species. While i would not like that to happen here i noticed last year when i wrote about F1s that nearly every one was marked or diseased. The fishery owner stated it was cormorants ,i said bull...t
The new breed of angler just cannot handle the river and that is why i have no respect for them

Graham
Just think Dave has had enough,he once told me he did not think he was good enough these days and would make a fool of himself . I told him Dave i will come along just to see you tackle up,the man won more matches on bad swims than any other. I fell out with Angling Times when Dave was not in top fifty anglers.he would have been in my top five and a toss up between him and Ivan who won.
Because of my style of fishing which is fast rivers and the stickfloat Dave is my No1,he was the best in my mind at least

There are some excellent points braught up in this thread as to the decline of match fishing.
Pools fodder and Commercials being the main two contributors as far as I am concerned.
But again in my oppinion, far too much emphasiss has been put on 'pole' fishing, and not enough on the use of rod and line.
It all comes down to cost, as many parents can not afford a pole set up if they have more than one child who wants to try his hand.
I have seen children ignored in teach ins all because they do not own a pole. It is as if they are considered a waste of time.
We must consider every child who shows a willingness to learn the art of match fishing.
In my honest opinion, we have not looked to the future far enough. All aspects of angling depend on each other, wether it be specimen pleasure or match. But a lot of clubs saw the ? signs in match fishing, and anything else could look after its self.
A more proffesional ballance of the three diciplines needs to be looked at, or all of them will suffer.
It may seem I have gone off track a little, but we have to look at the bigger picture, if match fishing is to survive.

Good post Baz.

However, its often the match sections of a lot of small clubs that provide the bulk of members without which the number of club waters available to pleasure anglers would undoubtedly diminish.

Any views on whether we will still have Nationals and AT Winter Leagues in five, ten years time?

For many of the regular match anglers I know the xmas match is their first time on the river each season such is the domination of still waters.

Winter leagues are a very costly affair these days, what with the cost of travelling, bait etc. and I reckon they will die a natural death in the coming years for that very reason. Carp match lakes will be the only place where matches are run and these will be in the form of opens. Bear in mind that some of these already run some very lucrative leagues of their own as well as some "all winners" or "ton up" finals.

Nationals? Who will qualify if there are no winter leagues and the lack of leagues will make the NFA redundant, result? No nationals.

I think my first thoughts on this after another insightful article by Mark was that I'm not bothered. I don't match fish but certainly don't set my stall and rod pod out for specimen carp either, nor sit on bagging commercials waiting for kamikaze carp to hang themselves.

Then my brain - small as it is - gave it some more thought and I can see that if match fishing was to disappear it would be rather sad. Not just because a whole separate approach to angling had disappeared leaving the more recent branches like carping/comm. But also because it would undoubtedly be a symptom that even more anglers were abandoning the traditional arts of fishing -waggler, stick etc - which is something that I can only see happening more and more. The commecial subject has cropped up so many times before on here but there is no doubt that it does cause an adverse effect on the skill levels of the anglers who have recently taken up angling and those yet to start. Even now if I found myself on a pool that has plenty of hungry fish that evryone else is hauling out on a pole I'll still set up my waggler rod and fish how I enjoy. I suppose that when a great angler like Ken Giles exclusively fishes carp bagging pools and loves it with all the skill he can call upon then it should be no surprise that less experienced or skillful anglers will happily sit in the comfort zone that is the modern carp pool.

With so many of these matches fished on pools like this more and more anglers are disillusioned by rivers and the lower catch rate and a lot of clubs and societies are letting leases go meaning less and less readily accessible rivers - then obviously less anglers capable of fishing them in the long run.

How can this be reversed or at least prevented from getting worse? Now my brain is telling me that I do care rather a lot and would like to know the answers.

Oh - and I had some of those green plastic stemmed Dave Thomas stick floats from about 1981 I think. Anyone remember them? One of the best I used from my viewpoint anyway as I was shown how to stick fish using them.

Verbal diahorrhea now I know but would like to agree with John - 10lb of river roach is something special and beats a netful of pool carp every time. No question....

One point that was mentioned was when a topflight angler draws his peg number, he might decide not to fish that match and go elsewhere, where another more favourable peg has been drawn for him.
I can well remember the shouts of unfairness when this was happening in the 80's early 90's. There were regular reports of this kind of thing happening in the angling press.
By the angler going elsewhere, he also left an empty space where anglers either side of his peg would have an advantage over everybody else, (more space to fish).
The warnings were there then, so we can't say we were not warned. Clubs and organisers should have jumped on this sort of activity straight away.
Keep some waters for big prize money, but bring back the matches that are affordable to the average person and newcomer to angling.
A club might have some up and comeing anglers on their books, and may want to encourage them, but not at the expence of everyone else by seeing to it that certain people got the best pegs every week.
I was in a club many years back, where I unearthed the cheating that was going on, needless to say, I am in it no longer.
The higher the prize money, means that anglers will get more disillusioned with the sport sooner rather than later.
Angling is now a big business, and I think that is where our problems lie.
Somehow we must get at least part of it back to what it used to be, if we want to survive.

Careless pegging of matches especially in the winter is another cause of discontent amongst anglers. This is the time of year when fish shoal up, and we all know that unless you are in a certain area, you might just as well pack up and go home. On some stretches of river unless you are on the favoured pegs you are wasting your time. To make things more even, the hot pegs should be taken out of the draw, then every body has a chance.

'One point that was mentioned was when a topflight angler draws his peg number, he might decide not to fish that match and go elsewhere, where another more favourable peg has been drawn for him.'

I must have led a sheltered life. If this was a footballer he'd be called a spoilt prima donna. How many have we got in angling today do you think?

How many match clubs are there?
There must be at least two of this kind in every one of them, given the chance.

Lost count of the number of times one well known angler regular on TV drew the number one chub peg on the Derwent at Barrowash and Amberston.With that luck he would have won the lottery every week and no one said a word.
I fished this river a lot and knew every swim and its potential weight,it just beggared belief or am i just a jealous cynic

No John you are not a jelous cynic.
I have questioned that very thing, only to be told it is the luck of the draw.
In a pigs eye it is.