Monday Top 5 - Match Fishing Tips

This entry was posted on 14th May, 2018

Match fishing is hugely popular. The buzz of testing your skills against other anglers as well as the fish certainly adds some excitement to your day's fishing. With more and more big cash prizes available on the UK and European match fishing circuit, there's certainly a great deal for the budding match anglers that Angling Direct cater for to get up to. The difference between winning a match and losing can sometimes be fine, so every fish counts. Here are a few tips for you to think about when you fish your next match:

Preparation

Pretty self explanatory, but have everything prepared prior to your arrival at the venue. This includes hooklengths, feeders, and rigs, all the way down to the most essential of items such as your landing net. Being prepared can not only allow you to fish more efficiently, but it also means you will spend more time actually in the water fishing, rather then tying or sorting. The more time you are in the water, the more chance you have of catching fish.



Plan A, Plan B, Plan C

Don’t just have one plan of attack. If this works for the full duration of the match, then great; count your lucky stars, and enjoy the winnings. However, if this method stops producing you need to be able to resort to another plan to keep bites coming and weight going in your keep net. The best way to think about it is to have a couple of pole lines and a feeder line, all of which you feed and rotate around to keep bites coming.



Homework

Once you enter a match, speak to regular anglers at the venue and get some information. Even better, head down and practice on the lake. Choose different swims, as you never know where you’ll draw, and then build a picture of possible potential baits, swims and methods that work best. This will give you a good base of knowledge when it comes to fishing a match on that venue. Use social media as well, and chat to anglers who have had good results on the venue, as well as the fishery owners.

Stay Calm

Even if it feels that everyone is catching and you're not, stick to what you know will work, and what you do best. Keep an eye on what methods look to be working, but stay calm, and fish the match the way you’ve planned. Often in match fishing the latter half and ‘golden’ last hour can decide the outcome, so make sure you have given yourself the best chance to maximise this time and don’t panic and change everything because someone has started well.



Targets

Set yourself a target by breaking the match down into half hour or hour sections; if you have a target weight of 100lbs for a 5 hour match, then you know that each hour you are looking for 20lb of fish. Keep a running total in your head and reassess things as the match goes on. This will help you stay calm, especially if you feel the pressure is getting to you.



 

Above all else, enjoy the competition and banter that comes with match fishing. It’s a great way to sample new venues and meet like minded anglers. Also it's all done in 5 hours, so plenty of time to go back and spend the rest of the day with the family; there can't be any complains there! Lol

I hope the following tips help you the next time you head out fishing a match. Best of luck and tight lines.