FOLLOWING midweek flooding, the Ouse below York had dropped to around two feet above normal for the Bill Noakes Cup.

After recent poor ticket sales that have led to several match cancellations, the entry of 45 was, surprisingly, up on last year.

With the river coloured it was always going to be bream that decided the contest and Mick Potter (Anglers World) captured his early in the day.

Pegged in the bay at Fulford his legered lobby located his only two bites in the opening 20 minutes.

His brace of slabs scaled in at 7-12-0 with his best fish nearly 5lb.

Derek Barker (Acomb Tackle) was at the peg below and used the same approach for a bream plus skimmers and eels for his 7-4-0.

Others: Dean Smith (Derwent Valley) 7-3-0; Steve Blythe (York) 6-10-0; Keith Mitchell (Selby) 6-3-8; Phil Austin (Team Daiwa Armley Angling) 5-5-0.

Wednesday's 35 pegger at Carpvale went to Andy Spaling (Leeds) who used method feeder with maggot from peg 49 for 9 carp and 36-8-0.

Bernard Guy (East End Park) took second with another feeder catch of 29-4-0.

Others: Tony Hodgson (York) 23-2-0; Dave Armitage (Normark) 22-12-0; Brian Husthwaite (Team Daiwa Armley Angling) 20-8-0.

Brandon Birch (Van den Eynde Goole) topped the 30 peg Allerton Bywater open on the Aire and Calder Navigation at Woodlesford.

Drawn on peg 35 he worked with pole and maggot at 11 metres for a mixed bag of roach perch and gudgeon.

Others: John Gee (Van den Eynde Goole) 4-5-0; Chris Burton (Anglers World) 4-4-0; Barry Wright (Allerton Bywater Victoria) 3-9-0.

The 27 peg Boroughbridge open on the Ure at Boroughbridge went to Pete Riley (Boroughbridge) with a surprise 8-13-0 from peg 74 at Alms Lane.

Fishing a groundbait feeder with punched bread he netted a chub plus plenty of roach.

Alf Milnes (Boroughbridge) also had a surprise at peg 50 where the first two fish to take his stick floated maggots were big eels.

He went on to add some small roach for his 6-2-0.

Others: Garry Lumsden (Boroughbridge) 5-15-0; Martin Whittaker (Ripon) 5-13-0; Graham Brammer (Knaresborough) 5-5-0.

Pete Nicholson (Cleveland Angling Centre) took the 19 peg Bradford City open on the Ure at Boroughbridge with 8-11-0.

Drawn on peg 18 in the Rough Field he took a good bream on legered meat before adding roach and perch on caster feeder.

Others: Dave Robson (Selby) 7-13-0; Bob Ramshaw (Team Daiwa Armley Angling) 6-2-0; Trevor Wheatley (leeds) 5-12-0.

Transpennine raiders took the top spots in Saturday's 68 pegger at Woodlands.

Mark Lucas (Ted Carter Preston) took the honours from Partridge 2.

After starting at three metres with corn he switched to a worm attack at nine metres where he found small carp, tench and chub for 48-6-0.

At Partridge 17 Dave Jowett (Fishermens Way) stuck to the worm at 11 and 12 metres for his 44-11-0 of carp to 4lb.

Others: Mick Phillips (MAP Elton) 35-14-0; Bill Blythe (Middlesborough Newman Scotts) 34-2-0; John Beaver (Team Pastry) 33-2-0; Steve Fearnley (Normark) 31-8-0.

RESULTS

York RI: M Pearson 10lb 9oz (inc bream 4lb 10oz), J L Redhead 5-13, B M Sawyer 3-1, R Hutchinson 1-13, E Thompson 0-15.