Today is the last official practice session for Drennan Team England and the other 25 nations involved in the European Championship.
The venue this year is the Lage Vaart Canal in Almere, Holland, which has been used several times in international events. This basically translates as the Lower Level Canal, so it’s several metres below sea level.
It is around 50 metres wide and the match length is 2.5km long. The Johnsonpad cycle path is immediately behind the anglers, which gives them easy access on the day. Boats are also not allowed on the match length during the competition.
The target species will include roach, skimmers, perch, ruffe plus the all-important bream which are up to 4kg in size and could prove extremely decisive. In 2009 the World Championship was held on this venue and bream were decisive for Russia who successfully targeted the species with worms and raw joker at 13 metres to win gold.
This year the temperatures have been extremely hot during practice, up to 35 degrees, and sport has been expectedly difficult. Fish have been caught early and late with anglers struggling during the middle part of the day. Perch have been dominant with odd small roach and pockets of bream. When the bream are in the peg you can often catch two or three of these quality fish. They are also taking some time to land on light tackle. Now the weather is getting slightly cooler and a few showers are forecast things will hopefully improve for the two-day event. Pole with bloodworm, joker and ground bait or soil/leam will probably be the dominant tactic although the waggler and slider might also play a part if conditions allow.
The Drennan Team England squad is a real mixture of youth and experience and consists of Alan Scotthorne, William Raison, Sean Ashby, Lee Kerry, Matt Godfrey and Matt Derry. The last two anglers are fishing their first ever European event and will be hoping to perform well for co-managers Mark Addy and Mark Downes.
Keep an eye on the www.drennantackle.com website and our Facebook and Twitter pages for further updates!