‘2 Trofeo Tubertini Coppa Italia 2016 Organized by ASD Fish & Furious Ragusa Tubertini'.
Once again Hooked On Fishing Club Malta were invited over to Sicily to compete with our Sicilian friends for the ‘2 Trofeo Tubertini Coppa Italia organized by our friends ASD Fish & Furious Ragusa Tubertini’. There were 12 members that were interested to join the team going over to compete with 11 Anglers & 1 Supporter they were Adrian Nelson, Alexander Spiteri, Duncan Demicoli, Ganni Borg, James Gilson, Lawrence Pulis,
Matthew Dimech, Michael Godfrey, Miguel Grech, Peter Paul Azzopardi, Raymond Farrugia & Sheldon Bouvett. In this occasion there was also the presence of another Sport Fishing Club KFSA which was quite a pleasant situation, seeing two Clubs from Malta united as 1 with one vision to make Malta proud.
The team started to make their way over to Sicily on Saturday the 30th April 2016 were they managed to have a few hours of practice time which was not all doom & gloom, as the practice was at the same venue our teams fished last which was not that great. There was quite some fish caught on the day by all anglers that practiced, which were a few nice sized Mullet & various bream caught.
Both Clubs stayed at the same Bed & breakfast was, you could see everyone sharing information & rigging up their tackle for the next day. Everyone got on very well & latter on the evening we all went out for a meal which was not lacking any angling knowledge with everyone discussing techniques & other experiences they had in previous occasions. It was time to go back to the Bed & Breakfast to get some sleep as it was early doors in the morning to go down to the venue for 06:30hrs in the morning.
Gathered round to see were the pegs were going to be & were everyone was going to be fishing. Straight away you could see concerns from all Anglers that there was quite a lot of strong Currents especially when the tide was coming in. The local anglers advised that this is always the case & that it will calm down within an hour or two. The Start signal was not going to be sounded until 09:00hrs so there was time for the current to slow down. Once everyone was ready at the fishing spots & rigged up the signal was set off to start the match. There was not any fish biting & proving very difficult with the strong currents still on-going. Nothing changed with regards to sea conditions throughout the whole time so as you can imagine there was not too many fish caught. There was a few bream caught by some anglers at some spots mainly it was the Anglers that opted to use the lead weight rather than just floats & shot pellets. As the competition was coming to the end there was a few spots that had caught some small Mullet & a couple of big ones too. These spots made the difference to most of the final placings. Unfortunate for some were in the same section which meant they would place below the 7th rankings. All in all it was a very good result for Malta as we had 5 of our members that placed in the first 21 , with Lawrence Pulis placing 5th overall , Miguel Grech in 13th place , James Gilson in 14th Place , Matthew Dimech in 18th place & Raymond Farrugia in 19th place. There was also a very good result from another club KFSA that travelled together & also took part to honour Malta were 4 of their members also managed to place in the top 21 which 1 was the Winner of the 2 Trofeo Tubertini Coppa Italia, 2nd place , 8th place & 21st place. It was very good to see 2 Clubs sharing all their knowledge & experience with one aim in mind to make Malta proud which looking at the results the plan was carried out successfully. Also big thanks to both clubs committee members for working so hard to make this possible.
Unfortunately there was an error made when it came to presentation of the Club Winner on the day & the trophy was presented to another Club . We were contacted a couple of days later to say that there was an error & that it should have been indeed Hooked On fishing Club Malta the champions for clubs in this 2 Trofeo Tubertini Coppa Italia.
All in All this was a great experience for all that took part & a great result outcome for Malta.