The first-ever Fish North final turned out to be a spectacular event, with it going right down to the final whistle to see who would be crowned the champion.

The draw for the match took place the night before at The Station Inn Tollerton where the 15 finalists enjoyed a buffet courtesy of the Sation Inn before they gathered outside to draw their pegs for the Final. One lucky person would be walking away with £12,000 a the title of Fish North champion 2019.

The anglers would begin the match at 12 noon on Saturday and fish through to 5 pm. After enjoying one of the renown Forest Lane Breakfasts, the anglers slowly descended on the Arena lake to prepare for the battle ahead.

The all-in was called at 12 noon and within minutes Anglers were catching the stock of small mirror and common carp. A mix of tactics was being used with two methods dominating the proceedings, Maggots and Slop fishing shallow.

Live Facebook coverage on the day was presented by Catch More Media, which proved to be a huge success with the audience online, who was served with regular updates of how the match was progressing. The weather was on everyone’s side today with the spectators and anglers all enjoying bright warm sunshine for the entire day which set the scene for a great day out.

The 15 participants around the Arena all caught plenty of fish. Throughout the match, it was hard to call who would take the crown with Adam Richards getting off to a great start and really pushing ahead, but close behind was Scott Brady, Andy Bennett, Dylan Blyth and Danny Scott. Unfortunately for Adam, his peg seemed to fade as others just got stronger. It was only until the last hour you could make out who the contenders were, we felt it was between Scott, Dylan, Danny and Andy.

A tense battle progressed and Andy and Scott were almost fish for fish and the pundits’ view was it would be between these two for the title.

The weigh-in was such a tense affair, as spectators gathered they followed the stewards as the fish were weighed to see who would have the biggest weight of the day, as this was what crowned our winner. The first to weigh was Scott, who put a magnificent 154lb 7oz on the scales and this set the benchmark, as we went through the weighing everyone gathered to see how Andy Bennett had faired, but when his last net went in and showed on the scales the gasps could be heard, he was just short of Scott’s weight putting in 152lb 12oz.

As we went to each angler it was only when we got around to Danny Scott would a weight get close to the benchmark, he put 133lb 2oz on the scales and it seemed 3rd place would be his, with only two more to weigh and so it proved.

After Ash Clements who was last to weigh, the realisation was there to see for Scott, he was now Fish North champion 2019, a worthy winner who stuck to his guns all match fishing slop shallow and fished a very tidy match. Shouts of jump in could be heard and after some quick photos and emptying of pockets, he duly did the duty of the lake dunk with a run and dive into the lake.

It was then off to the cafe for the presentation and the crowning of the winner.

This was a benchmark set for Fish North, a fantastic day had by all and weather to boot. Congratulations were sent from all directions and we had our Fish North champion 2019, Scott Brady.