Darts now officially recognised as a sport....

celticfc

..... & about time too.

From BBC Sport:

UK sports councils embrace darts

Darts has been officially recognised as a sport by all of the sports councils in the United Kingdom.
Sport England recognised darts as a sporting activity in March and Sport Wales, Sport Northern Ireland and Sport Scotland have now followed suit.

"Recognition will allow us the right to apply for Sports Council and Lottery grants," said Olly Croft of the British Darts Organisation.

"This is one of the greatest days in the history of darts."

Me awaits all the ["WTF, Darts is not a "proper" sport"] whingers to come out in their droves....

Victor

But hasn't snooker been recognised all along?

Guy:Incognito

Must have been the new fitter training system they introduced.

Geiger

I'd love to know what the PPV buyrate was for Taylor vs Fordham...

Anyone here buy it?

Mossy Monk

god no and watching the repeat on regular Sky Sports the following friday i was glad i didnt

Kingp35

its about time darts was recognised as a proper sport. It may not have the physical aspect of some sports but neither does snooker or pool. Darts has come on leaps and bounds with respect to popularity. Every single venue is sold out within hours of going on sale all of the time!! You can not get a ticket for love nor money. Ill give you an example.

In order to get tickets to the BDO world championships in January(which is less popular than the PDC)you must fill out an application form and say whether you want a ticket for one session, the last four days or the whole tournament with preference been given to the latter two. Its then a lottery with people being drawn at random to see who gains tickets. That is the popularity of the sport at the moment.

A game of darts is very exciting to watch there is such tension involved. To be in the crowd at a darts tournament is a fantastic experience. You would be hard pushed to find a better atmosphere and its like a giant pub with everyone cheering on the players. Its brilliant. If anyone has a problem with darts being a sport try and get yourself some tickets to the world darts grand prix in the city west hotel dublin this october(will be very hard to get) and you will see the sport is becoming so popular. Also check out darts on sky sports, the las vegas desert classic will be on at the end of the month which will be held in the MGM grand hotel which boasts the biggest casino in the world. The premier league of darts has also recently ended with every venue being sold out well in advance and some really entertaining nights of darts. It is sure to be a regular on the darts calendar now.

The uk championships has just ended last night with Phil "the power" Taylor victorious again. He hit a 9 dart finish in the semi-final with only one other player ever having succeeded in doing the same live on tv. That player being John Lowe. There were some truely brilliant matches especially Taylor against part where part was 1-7 up and taylor fought back to win 11-10. The crowd were going nuts. Taylor beat Mark Walshe, a reletively unknown player, 13-7 in the final to win back the tournament.

Im 20yrs old now but have been watching darts for years and look forward to every christmas when the world championships are on and finally this year I will be able to go to the tournament I cant wait.

Check out the official PDC site www.planetdarts.co.uk. You can download videos of taylor hitting the 9 dart finish plus all the news and tournaments and stuff that are on this year. It also has details of how you can get tickets for various events.

Its about time darts has been made a sport. It deserves it