Andy Pollard triumphed in the Upper Thames Championship with a winning weight of 24.4.0, also helping the Daiwa Golden League outfit to the team title.

Drawing peg 51 at Rushey Weir, the Stroud angler caught a cracking perch of 3.10.0, plus a number of smaller specimens, but his best fish was a magnificent 14.15.0 barbel that took half a lobworm presented about three metres from the bank on the pole.

He fed 50 pieces of chopped worm and caster, with half a lobworm on a size 8 hook.

I bet that barbel stretched his Black Hydro elastic!

THE hot weather was far from ideal for the Lure Anglers Society’s perch match on the Alliance stretch of the Thames at Eynsham, which attracted 24 entries.

Very few fish were caught, but Andy Radford recorded the best of the day, a nice perch of 3.4.0 using a lure on a drop-shot rig.