Richie's On Fire!

Reynolds wins three consecutive river matches.
Shakespeare Superteam star Richie Reynolds is enjoying a blistering run of form at the minute- winning his last three matches on three different stretches of river. His first notable win came in the Barford Winter League, on the Hop Yards stretch of the Warwickshire Avon. A double barrelled attack of caster at five metres, and hemp at seven metres saw him net quality roach for a convincing win of the lower half of the river.

Despite winning the match, Richie was convinced he could have caught even more roach had he taken some tares with him. The following day saw him venture to the Old River Nene at March, to take part in a 95 peg open match- and he was determined not to make the same mistake twice!

After drawing peg 23 on the Nene Parade, Richie decided to base his approach around fishing bread punch to hand, and also put a line with hemp and tares across to the far bank of the river. After a good start on bread, he dropped on his long pole line, where he found bigger roach on tare. By constantly switching between the two lines, five hours later he won the match with a massive 24lb 7oz.

With Richie’s confidence high, the next weekend he ventured to Evesham to take part in the Ferrymen Winter League. A hard frost, combined with a tinge of colour in the water made Richie believe that the fishing would be tough, so he based his approach around catching bleak to start with. With three and a half hours of the match gone, he had 3lb in the net- which he felt would be a reasonable weight on the day, and gave him the option of having a look for a bigger fish.  He put his faith in a bread feeder approach, fishing three quarters of the way across the river with a big piece of bread flake on the hook and bread crumb in the feeder. A roach and a skimmer boosted his total to around 4lb- before his final bite of the day saw him connect with something much bigger. Minutes later, a 4lb bream was netted giving  him an 8lb 1oz total, enough for a third consecutive win.

Richie commented: “I have had a slightly disappointing season up to now this year, and although I have won my fair share of sections and had the odd fourth and fifth frame placing, I have felt I have lacked that extra few fish needed to win. I have long been a believer in the saying perseverance pays though, and in these last few matches it is nice that things have finally started to go my way.”

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