02.08.12

Team England Takes Bronze

The recent Feeder World Championships, held in Belgium, saw two Guru-backed anglers fishing for Team England. Steve Ringer and Dean Barlow both contributed heavily to a bronze-medal finish for the team. Steve bagged sixth place overall, but after the event he was clearly disappointed and felt that it had been a chance missed for Team England as Holland took top spot and Hungary the silver medal. Steve takes up the story of the match from his perspective…

“The first day I drew A-Section, which was the only section that we hadn’t practiced and as a result, I didn’t really know what to expect. As it happened, it fished pretty hard – I had four bream and a carassio for fourth in section, which, in hindsight, I was quite happy with. There were two end pegs in that section, both of which are likely to beat you, and I got beaten by someone in the middle as well. However, I felt that I’d done a good job for the team.

Day two saw me draw at the wrong end of B section. I had one bream early on and two bream late in the match, the last of which was with 20 seconds to go. I ended up third in section, which I was over the moon with – I couldn’t have fished a better match. Overall though, I was disappointed. I went out there thinking that we weren’t definitely going to win gold, and I came back thinking that we really had been given a great chance of winning gold. It was a venue that suited us and the teams that beat us basically copied us, so that was a bit hard to take.

The worst part is that we didn’t win, we got bronze, which is an improvement on Italy last time out, but at the same time, it’s not what we want. The upside is that we’ve got South Africa to come, but it’s seventeen months away and we’ve got to wait that long right the wrongs of Belgium.”

Steve’s Guru stable mate, Dean Barlow also gave us his thoughts on the contest. “We always thought that we really had a good chance of gold, but that’s team fishing, it just slipped away. It was a brilliant experience – you can’t get any better than fishing at World level. World level is exactly that – you’re fishing against the best anglers in the World. I can’t wait to try again if I’m selected for South Africa.”

We hope that both the lads can go a couple of steps further next time out in South Africa!

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