To those of us watching this championship every adjective rings true. England were simply fantastic. Each one of the 15 nations taking part had been practising all week on Furzton and I'd spent a day watching the teams. I had travelled up to MK on the Tuesday with the family and at the end of the day I asked my eldest daughter Ruth (9) who were the best teams she had seen. Without hesitation she said England, France and Italy.

Ruth is no clairvoyant but she had seen the top teams clearly enough. By the end of day one England were leading with three section wins, a second and a joint 6th. This left them with 11.5 points just two and half points ahead of France with Italy third on 22 points.

The ideal venue
Furzton looks and feels a perfect match venue - plenty of small silver fish in every peg with the odd bonus perch, roach, bream or skimmer. England could not rest easy because this style of fishing suited the French down to the ground. Day 2 proved just how fair this venue is. Between the top teams each section was close, too close to call for many of the managers and pundits watching the match. England drew well enough and were catching steadily by the end of the first hour. So too were the French with the Italians slower off the mark.

The second hour saw the Italians net some better fish but both England and France continued to catch steadily, between 20 and 35 fish an hour. By the time the whistle went both teams felt confident that they had done enough. The word in the French camp was that they had caught up on the English in some sections whilst the English felt the whole thing was a bit too close to call. How right were they! In section D, Dominique Meissiri took a point off Helen Dagnall by just 20 grams! But sweet revenge came in C section where Sandra beat Chantalle Joris, again by 20 grams, to not only take the section but seal a gold crown on her head!!! Sandra weighing in 2.330kg to Chantalle's 2.310kg. Suddenly information started to come in from other sections. It was sections A and B which ultimately decided the final team placings with Emma Pickering and Wendy Locker winning their respective sections and taking, in the process, NINE points off the French to ram home their superiority. Wendy Lythgoe was beaten by three bonus bream weights but she still managed to finish just ahead of her French counterpart, Sylvie Dupre. However it was the failings of the French in sections A & B which sealed their fate and England comfortably clinched the team gold in emphatic style, finishing with 24.5 points, ahead of France on 35 and Italy on 46.

Top right: Helen Dagnall on D7 couldn't press home her 1 point advantage from day one but held her French counterpart to just a single points advantage thereby helping England stave off any French challenge.
Above: B section gets off to the normal GB barrage. This was Wendy Locker's section which she won comfortably.

Above & right: Not only is she is the girlfriend of Declic Peche's Editor, Nicolas Beroud, but the lovely Livia Hafdy is an accomplished angler in her own right as she proved with this day two 1.550kg which earned her a 5th in section C for her team Hungary.

Very impressive
One impressive feature of this Ladies world championships was the general standard of angling across the board. There is however a difference in organisation, professionalism and support between the top three countries and the rest of the world which seemed obvious, even to a 9 year old, but behind these countries are a number of other proficient teams who look very good indeed. Hungary and Portugal in particular showed potential by fielding some highly talented anglers along with a number of others who caught the eye (the Czech's in particular)!!!

Above left: Diana Frohlichova of the Czech Republic showed why she's an up and coming talent after day one with a 5th placing in section C (picture courtesy of Dave Harper). Above centre: Day two didn't get any better for Diana by finishing 11th in section, she must have changed tactics as well as her bikini! Above right: Another Czech stunning performance came from Petra Skerikova who took 3rd in section B, day two, to place her 12th overall.... they both deserve top points in my book!

The individual race
On a fair venue you expect the individual title to be won with two, or at worst three points, over the two days (remember that there is 1 point for a section win on each day). At the end of day one, three English anglers, Wendy Lythgoe, Sandra Scotthorne and Helen Dagnall were on 1 point along with Isabel Hawryhuck of France and Stefania Conforto of Italy. With Wendy Locker and Luana Almeida of Portugal on 2 points the individual winners seemed more than likely to come from this group and true to form day two saw the individual crown see-saw between these ladies.

Above left: Wendy Lythgoe with part of her day one winning 6 kilo weight from A3. Above right: Sandra Scotthorne display the second highest day one weight of 5.240kgs. Both ladies were poised for individual glory going into the final day. (pictures courtesy of Steve Martin)

The final hurdle
At the start of the final day Wendy Lythgoe looked favourite on the end peg in E section, but as we have said she was beaten by the odd bonus bream in her section. Helen Dagnall was fishing in the split D section and looked to take early control, netting some good perch to push her ahead. Sandra was catching steadily in the hard C section but half way through the match word came that Stefania Conforto had netted a couple of good fish to put her ahead in this section. Wendy Locker was doing well in B section and looked to be winning it but with only 2 points from the first day was this going to be enough? As the match went into the final hour things were getting tense. The press pack (those who bothered to attend) were debating which section to concentrate on, for that winning net shot, when more news filtered down the bank. Helen Dagnall was being beaten by a couple of anglers on the top part of her split section who had caught some better bream, pushing her back down the section. Suddenly attention switched back to Sandra who had continued to catch steadily whilst the Italian, Stefania Conforto, had slowed down. This was becoming all too much to bear, especially for Sandra's hubby 3x World Champion Alan! In the end Sandra won C section by a mere 20 grams for that perfect 2 point score. Wendy Locker, with her section win on Sunday snatched silver with 3 points and the young Portuguese angler, Luana Almeida, recorded a 2nd in section to grab bronze with 4 points - close or what?

Left: Sandra takes no chances with a dropped fish... just bout everything was netted... a cautious approach which paid handsome dividends at the end of the day.

Below left: The moment of truth... the scalesman prepares and checks Sandra's weight... after a few moments the scales level and he reads off 2.330 kilos! Would it be enough?

Below right: The only obstacle to outright victory... Chantal Joris on end peg 15... would she spoil the party? The scales steady the weight's read... 2.310 kilos! Sandra retains her World crown by 20 grams!!!

The difference between the teams
England dominated this match although it was no pushover. There are a few factors which help explain just why England are so good, the first is the whole team approach. Manager Tom Pickering understands better than most exactly what level of dedication is required to succeed in the top flight of this sport. For him fishing for England has always been the ultimate experience in angling and he brings this level of professionalism to the ladies team. Tom has a squad of helpers, husbands (like Alan Scotthorne), friends and family who have taken on the role of expert helpers to each member of his squad. These helpers provide support at the highest level, sorting tackle and groundbait for the squad leaving the anglers free to concentrate on just one thing - fishing. Tom is also wise enough to allow each angler to fish to their strengths and feel comfortable with the way they fish rather than impose a whole team "way" of fishing. This paid handsome dividends because the England squad were not only the best supported but the most relaxed team on the bank over the weekend.

Above: The full English squad complete with husbands, dads, relatives and friends who contributed so much to a fantastic English success.

Congratulations go to the runners up and third place teams:
France above and Italy below.
... maybe next year guys!!!

Wide support
The second is the wider support for the whole squad. This starts with financial support from the White Acres holiday complex, vital to any team hoping to compete at the very highest level. Add to this the wealth of experience which they can draw from the wider England team structure like Dick Clegg, Dave Vincent and the rest of senior men's squad. Inparticular, anglers such as William Raison and Steve Gardener are only a phone call away for advice thereby giving the England Ladies the best support structure of any team in the world at this point in time.

Quality
Finally, and perhaps most importantly, is the quality of the anglers themselves. England won this world championships because of their ability to catch some slightly better net stamp fish whilst still continuing to keep catching the smaller fish which made up the bulk of the weights. This was the main difference between England and France. The French caught as many, if not more fish than England, but they were generally smaller. England were able to take a few better fish without abandoning the bread and butter bits which made up the bulk of all the their catches this weekend. Emma Pickering, on Sunday in particular, had this down to an fine art. She switched hookbaits and rigs regularly to add better fish, when they were around, before going straight back to catching small fish on the bloodworm. Sandra Scotthorne resisted the temptation to feed for the larger fish to try to force the pace in her section. She kept taking any fish that came along, including the odd 70 to 100 gram roach right up to the end of the match. In the last 5 minutes she netted three of these fish and swung in a couple of bits. When you consider that she won her section by just 20 grams the decision to stay with the bits proved dead right as it kept her catching throughout the full three hours and got her those vital last minute fish - this was impressive angling!

A perfect weekend?
All in all you could consider the 2003 Ladies World Champs a resounding success. Double gold for England, hot weather and a cracking match venue full of fish. What more could you wish for? Well more spectators would have been nice, as would some sensation that you were at a major sporting event. Here we had the only World angling event on British soil this year and it drew a crowd of less than one thousand (including helpers and curious passers-by). This sparse crowd seemed at odds with the professionalism and dedication of the anglers participating. Once you took your eyes away from the fishing the atmosphere was more akin to a Sunday afternoon stroll than a major sporting event. This hand-knitted feeling ran right through to the low-key prize giving ceremony which lacked the razzamatazz of most other world events. No line-up of flags or interminable speeches from local dignitaries, not even a translator to give that exotic feel of a Eurovision Song Contest!

The reason why this event lacked the atmosphere of a big occasion is simple. There had been no press build up to the event to encourage people to come and watch it. From the top to the bottom, people in angling were apparently unaware of the event. Last weekend I was talking with Ian Dixon, of Preston Innovations Delcac, and he had no idea that the event was on and with a bank holiday weekend and other attractions such as the annual well publicised Evesham event (formerly the JS!), match anglers had seemingly made other arrangements!

I can just imagine the reasons given by the press... it doesn't interest our readers... we don't have enough space as we want to produce a miracle method feature every week, etc, etc! This is fair enough but I believe the press overlook, inparticular, the huge popularity of winter league fishing which bring together anglers from all levels. World events, when staged at home, give anglers from these levels a chance to see how top international teams work together and support each other. For any team, whether winter league or not, there are lessons to be learnt on informing, watching and running sections while deciding who is winning what in a tight and technical match... THIS IS MATCH FISHING AT THE HIGHEST LEVEL and it should be given the column inches it deserves!

I think we are wrong not to place more value on these world events and make them into something special. If thousands of spectators are prepared to go and watch Fish'O'Mania, where the prize is simply cold cash, surely the chance of watching someone being crowned the best in the world could encourage similar crowds, if they were promoted and organised as major sporting spectacles more voraciously.

This apart, for those few of us who watched the 2003 Ladies event it was a real treat. Congratulations to all the England squad and in particular Sandra on her exceptional double win. You were simply fantastic, awesome, brilliant... quick think of another adjective Tom!

Editor's Comment
I feel I should add something to David's assessment of the weekend. Whilst I agree that the press should have made the public more aware this web site could also be accused of not doing its bit for the event, for which we apologise and make some recompence with this large feature. Another consideration is that we must learn from others who have staged similar events as the general public have certain expectations when it comes to holding an event on the world stage... Paris 2001, Declic Open's, John Smiths and the Embassy Pairs Final come readily to mind as prime examples. Please don't let England suffer from MM Syndrome, our anglers can do no more than win Gold... let everyone else back them up with a similar top draw performance!

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