Korda Team England announced

After three hotly contested trials, hundreds of carp and hours of relentless effort, the squad that will represent Korda Carp Team England in September’s FIPSed World Championships has been announced and is as follows…

Mark Bartlett and Kevin Hewitt.
Jack Stamp and Kia Sanger
Dan Wildbore and Jake Wildbore
Billy Flowers and Jamie Londors (reserve pair)

Team manager, Ian Huntington, had this to say about the final stages of the selection process, “I can honestly say that picking the final four pairs has been the most difficult of tasks for Pete Holehouse and I. We feel that we have learnt a great deal that we can take forward, particularly at this level of angling. We agreed that all the remaining pairs in the trial process have shown similar ability to catch fish when presented with the opportunity.

With this in mind, we decided to base our selection on the pairs that we feel are best suited to tackle Lac Corbul, the World Championships venue in Romania. As we mentioned to the squad hopefuls at the Brasenose One trial, we have learnt a great deal recently about the venue and its carp stock and more importantly, recent match results.

 Likely winning section weights could be 800kg plus, made up from carp averaging 2kg each. There will of course be the fish that don’t weigh the required 1.5kg to also contend with, which will only add to the work rate required. Just counting the average number of fish needed in order to be competitive equals a rate of nearly six fish an hour, per pair, throughout the 72-hour period; hard going I think you will agree, especially if also confronted with significant numbers of non-weighing fish.”

Turning to the practicalities of launching an assault on the biggest prize in carp match fishing, Ian told us, “The real work starts now and we have a number of things planned now that we have announced the team. Firstly, we have a visit planned to the championship venue, leaving England on the 16th August and returning on the 19th August. Pete and I will travel to Romania to spend a couple of days gathering intelligence on the venue during a live FIPSed rules international tournament. All the three sectors and pegs to be used in the World Championships are part of this event and as the pegs have been purposely built specifically for the World champs, the intelligence we gather should prove invaluable. We also plan to hold a number of meetings to discuss tactics and team requirements. These will to give everybody a chance to discuss things as a group and the emphasis will be more on team discussion than actual fishing.”

One man who has more experience of huge international matches than most is Dick Clegg OBE, who is International Events Director at the Angling Trust. Dick told us, “The new management of the Angling Trust’s Carp Team England have been meticulous in their preparation for this year’s FIPSed World championships in Romania. Both Ian and Pete have really impressed me with their professional approach to both the team selection and the administration required to compete at international level.

I am sure that the team sponsor, Korda, will be of the same opinion and I believe that this squad is very capable of breaking South Africa’s stranglehold on the event. Well done to all those selected and if effort is going to be rewarded then a Gold medal is on its way back to England at the end of September. My thanks must go to Korda whose sponsorship involvement is paramount to the success of the team.”