Cork angler JP Molloy went one better than his recent silver medal in the Munster Open Shore and took the top honours last weekend at the Munster Closed competition. Organised by West Cork & District SAC, the competition was fished over 3 sessions in the Youghal area, with the famed Slob Bank and Youghal beach providing the venues. As ever, the PRO for West Cork has done a great job of a report, so we will just share it below.
Match 1-Slob bank
The weather had been shocking all week, so a bit of sunshine and dry weather was most welcome for the first match.
The Munster Open Gold was held on the Slob Bank two weeks prior to the Closed and that had fished very well so hopes were high that good numbers of fish would show up.
This match didn’t fish as well as the Open but it still produced good cards for the zone winners.
Zone A winner was Alan O’Dowling with 15 fish.
Zone B winner was Chris O’Sullivan with 9 fish.
Zone C winner was Mark Gargen with 14 fish.
Chris also had a rare conger on the slob to take the round fish pool. There was a good mix of species in this match made up of flounder, bass, cod, poor cod, pouting, whiting, conger, dogfish and silver eels.
Match 2-Youghal beach
Unlike match 1, we were greeted by heavy showers and winds at the start of this match.
Alan O’Dowling had a fine painted ray of 76cm at the start which would eventually win the flat fish pool.
Zone A winner on the night was Derek Kenrick with a mixed card of 8 fish made up of cod, whiting, dogfish, bass and coalfish. Zone B had the least amount of fish in this match.
Jamie Santry won this zone with 3 cod 40+ cm and Zone C was won by ‘Mr consistent’ JP Molloy with 9 fish again a mixed card of dogfish, conger, cod, poor cod and pouting.
Match 3-Slob Bank
So, Match 3 would decide the eventual winner.
The results were out on Sunday morning, and it was extremely tight.
Any of the top 5 anglers were in with a shot of winning. Numerous times the top position changed during the match. Each one of the top five had been in the lead at some stage, but it was to be JP Molloy’s day and he won Zone A with 11 fish to take the Munster Closed Gold title for the second year in a row.
Outstanding fishing JP and a big well done!
Zone B winner was Derek Kenrick with 12 fish, Derek finished second overall, well done Derek! Zone C winner was Mark “slob” Gargen who kept his fine form on the Slob going with 17 fish. Again like Match 1, lots of species showed on the bank with some nice 40cm+ cod making an appearance.
The overall top 5 were:
1st JP Molloy
2nd Derek Kenrick
3rd Alan O Dowling
4th Chris O Sullivan
5th Jamie Santry
These lads will represent Munster at next year’s inter-pros.
Finally a big thank you to all the lads in the club that helped out over the weekend to make this competition a success again. We also like to thank John Dennehy of Munster Council for helping us out. Lastly, thanks to Eric Gosnell for giving up his time to come to Youghal to present the Munster closed cup to JP Molloy.
