It was Des Taylor who told me that Matt was in fact a highly qualified man in company finance, earning big money.
But he gave all that up, and due to the fact that he was/is very well presented, was able to create the right impression with Angling Times and Shimano. He was able to get sponsorship from Shimano and was also able to get a regular slot in Anging Times, the country's biggest fishing publication. At that time, the editor of Angling Times was Keith Higginbottom who had Matt writing for beginners. I am sure Matt must have hated that as some of the stuff he created was darned awful.
I remember when he wrote am article on how to catch pike. He began with:
"I'm a dapper snapper and I'm looking for a slapper!"
But these were the Higginbottom days where they had a semi-naked ruffe slapper on page 3.
Remember?
And on top of all this, Matt was able to win the Drennan Cup, and a future making a living in angling was assured.
---------- Post added at 09:35 ---------- Previous post was at 09:21 ----------
I was surprised to hear that he had never had a double figure Tench ... i would have thought he would have.
He has had them over 8 lbs a number of times, as have I.
So does that make people like myself useless at catching tench?
**** Walker's biggest tench was only 5lbs 14oz, as was Fred J Taylor's, and Fred in his day was one of the greatest tench catchers of all time.