World Darts

Obviously, several of the players will go home for Christmas, others have chosen to stay in London to practice…..yes, even on Christmas Day! The Antipodean contingent are going to enjoy and English Christmas despite being out of the tournament.

Kiwi’s Warren Parry and Alan Bolton and Australian Steve MacArthur are more used to Christmas on the beach in hot temperatures but they are booked to stay in London until the end of the tournament, so it is Christmas dinner and a few ‘tinnies’ in the capital.

Phil Taylor, James Wade, Barney and a few others have all pledged that after the presents and the turkey, they will be putting in a few hours on the practice board at home!

One of the stars of the first week has been the man from Barbados Anthony Forde….what an experience for him and what a performance he put in against World Champion Raymond Van Barneveld.

For the day job, he works on the docks in Bridgetown – the capital of Barbados – but he has won fame and fortune at the Ally Pally…..his £4,000 prize money is a huge amount to him and the Brits love an underdog. When he played Barney, the packed house were behind Forde….and what a performance, as he took four legs off the Dutch ace and so nearly won a set.

Those same darts fans were certainly smiling as well, because Ladbrokes were offering 9/4 on Forde winning just one leg in the match….needless to say, they all piled on and took the bookies to the proverbial cleaners!

The famous Premier League Trophy was at the Alexandra Palace on Friday – courtesy of sponsors Barclays. It was the real trophy and not surprisingly, players and officials were queuing up to have their photos taken with the one of the most famous pieces of silverware in British sport.

This 2008 World Championship has received more publicity than ever before – attracting massive interest from the national newspapers. It is a daily occurrence to find full page features in the likes of The Sun, The Mail and The Mirror but the broadsheets have been rushing to the Ally Pally this week…..The Guardian, The Times and The Telegraph all featuring big pieces on the darts.

And those articles are not just confined to the sports pages either, because feature writers from all the nationals have been producing double-page spreads on the growth of darts and there has been many a story on ‘Our Sid’ with the voice of darts in huge demand from the journalists……Not bad for a veteran commentator Mr Waddell!

Finally for this side of Christmas, a tale about former World Champion Keith Deller. Of course, it was way back in 1983 when Deller famously came from nowhere to beat Eric Bristow at the Embassy World Championship.

Well, Keith now works as a ‘spotter’ for Sky Sports on all the big darts tournaments – helping the director and cameramen with where the darts may be going on the board. Even at his age, he is still very proud of his hair and went for a haircut up the road in Muswell Hill…..and he nearly fell out of his chair when he was charged £17 for the privilege! He is still going on about it now….anyone would think he is short of a pound or two!

The exclusive behind-the-scenes updates from the Alexandra Palace will be back after the Christmas break…..a very Merry Christmas from all at Courage Best to all darts fans around the world.