Already a World Cup winner after
enjoying a successful partnership with
Co Stompe, Barney seemed hungry to
add a second title to his CV and saved
Michael’s skin by making extremely
short work of the challenge posed by
Mickey Mansell, easily defeating him 4-0.
A scoreline that was to be repeated in the pairs to the team in orange and black as they just missed out on beating Phil Taylor’s record TV average of 118.66, at one stage averaging an extraordinary 120.
With the Dutch keeping their side of the bargain, the onus was then on Phil Taylor and Adrian Lewis to set-up the dream final and it seemed a formality when the Power fired in a bullseye to wipe out his score of 65 and beat Simon Whitlock with relative ease 4-1.
Ever the type to get under his
opponent’s skin and sensing Lewis’
declining form as the tournament
reached its latter stages, Paul Nicholson
gave an added roar up on stage as he overcame missing the bull for a 161 finish
to break in leg one and then followed up
with a 62 out for a 2-nil advantage.
A frighteningly easy looking 153
checkout for Lewis showed that he
still had plenty of fight left
in him but his doubles deserted him
just when he needed them to
land in their intended targets and square
the game at 3-3. Nicko was to show
no sympathy for his opponent,
hitting double 16 for a 4-2 win and giving Jackpot a cursory handshake and wave off the stage to further rub salt into the wounds ahead of a potentially explosive pairs between the two adversaries.
The Australians somewhat dirty tactics even extended to behind the scenes, with the TV cameras showing Whitlock visibly goading Taylor on the practice board as events unfolded on stage but it didn’t have the desired effect, far from it.
successive triumph and delivering darts lovers the dream final.
Two missed efforts and one fruitful throw at 116 from Taylor, the unsuccessful 116 checkouts being polished off by Lewis, put the English three legs ahead and when Nicholson surrendered his own chance at 116 it was game over, a 4-0 win keeping alive England’s dreams of a third