ON a barbel trip on the River Trent I’d spotted chub smashing fry on the surface near the far bank and, me being an opportunist, I just had to swap rigs and target them.
“I took off the long combi-hooklink and tied on a much shorter braided version before attaching a Nutrabaits River Plus boilie and a PVA bag of crumbed boilie and 8mm pellets to the hook.
“After around 40 minutes of fishing my tip smashed round and this fish tore off into the middle of the river, so I thought it was a barbel.
“When I got it close to the bank, though, and I saw it was a huge chub, my legs turned to jelly and I prayed it wouldn’t come off. Happily it didn’t!”