Langport league rd 3

Round 3 of the league and I regret, the last on the river. We duly met at the Arms and being top of the league the lads were in fine fettle with the banter. I was also very pleased that the Amigos seemed much more chipper and were dishing out plenty of abuse themselves despite being bottom. I had practised a few times on the river but the rain in week washed out the way I had intended to fish. I was drawn peg A1 which is the first peg below the town bridge. The river was down a little but coloured and pacey. End pegs had been a real bonus in the previous match ,so now I'd got one it was up to me to do the business. I also knew that Weston man Ron Stark had won the section from this peg on the previous match with bream. God again was smiling at me because this is also the shortest walk of all and I was going to give it some serious groundbait which I'd got to carry. On my left was Chard Remain's Dave Lawrence who I have known for years and get on well with , so a chat from time to time would be in order. I had weighed everything up and decided that I was going for it , so in went 15 babies heads of varying stiffness. I started on the whip and had a roach first put in followed by a chublet of about 250 grms. The first hour went OK but not catching very quickly , I was getting the odd better fish on the 2grm rig, holding back hard. I was just thinking about a look with the feeder when I was into a bream on the whip. The fish kicked hard in the flow but I felt pretty much in control . Bringing it towards the net I then realised just how much the river had dropped because I was struggling to get the net to it. Right on the rim of the net the hook pulled out. It lay just out reach for a moment before swimming off. Oh Golly Gosh ! Fiddlesticks I politely exclaimed. I uttered a few more polite sentiments when I realised that the rig was trashed when I pulled out. It is times like this that I wish I still smoked , a fag would make me feel so much better. I did have a bacon buttie which HG had kindly made for me so I pigged that back before changing rigs and assembling a 4 piece landing net handle. What a wally I am , I should have spotted that I needed it. Having lost the bream I spent a fruitless 45 mins on the feeder. The weed flowing down made feeder fishing difficult. Back on the whip and still breamless I chugged away, catching steadily but never fast. In the back of my mind always that escaped bream and that it would cost me something. 11/2 hours from the end I had another go with the feeder but it was really difficult now with more and more floating weed coming down .I had a couple of small fish on the feeder but with 1 hour to go decided it was the whip for the rest of the match. shortly after going back to the whip I hooked another bream. Determined not to lose this one as well I played it very carefully, slowly but surely taking control the fish was becoming tired. I was watching the line so intently I failed to see a big raft of weed which hit the line. Despite my best efforts the fish and weed raft became one entangled mass and it came off. The polite words were almost a scream now but the bottom line was I had now lost 2 and I was gutted. I did manage to strangle a smaller one of around 2lbs + a good hybrid but on the whistle I was not a happy chappie. I knew very little about how the rest of the section had done but as I'd got the scales I would soon find out. Amigo John Buckingham weighed 3 kilos + from the end peg downstream for third in section most of this weight being a single bream. A few other people had single bream but Dicky Bull had more smaller fish with his for 2nd in section with 3kilos + . I suppose I should have been pleased with a section win and 3rd individual with 6kilos + but in truth it was a match lost rather than a section won. Amigo Mark Vigar won the match with 8 kilos and I lost 2nd place by a few grams. Losing big fish nearly always costs and this was no exception .We also had an indifferent day team wise with 26 points and lost our place on top the league. The Amigos had done well and have made up some ground. The next 3 rounds are on Stathe Drain which is probally my least favourite venue in the county. Wish me luck. At least the £87 quid winnings made me feel a bit better . I even bought the Amigos a drink.