set of darts courtesy of new sponsors,
Target, having just signed a five year
contract.
Then the unthinkable happened, annihilation 0-7 in
just 13 minutes buy new world champion Michael
van Gerwen. Tournament sponsors Betway gave odds
of 66/1 for such a score before the match.
The king was dead. Long live the king.
Or was he?
Three days later the 53-year-old was back to his
brilliant best in the third UK Open Qualifier, winning
the event and hitting two nine-darters in one day –
the latter was to win the final against protégé and
twice world champion Adrian Lewis.
Lewis then beat Taylor 7-3 the following Thursday in
the Premier League which, was followed by a loss to
world championship runner-up Peter Wright.
‘The Power’ now sat joint bottom of the league.
In a later interview with The Mirror’s Mike Walters on
Premier League Judgement Night in Cardiff, Taylor
admitted to suffering sleepless nights wondering
when, like United, his on stage form was going to
improve, and just what the cause of his poor run of
results was.
“I
understood
there were one
or two barbed
remarks on Twitter
comparing Phil’s
dip in form with
United. I had drawn the same comparison myself.”
Says Walters.
five,
Taylor
averaged
99.91 compared
to Anderson’s 96.1,
yet it was Anderson who
won the match 7-5.
Taylor was not playing badly; rather
he was just playing badly compared to
what we’ve seen in the past quarter of a
century, again rather like United.
Then came the UK Open, ‘the FA Cup of Darts’.
Taylor was seeded straight into the third round
just like a Premier League football team thanks to
his victory in the third qualifier. He was drawn to
play Aden Kirk, a 22-year-old factory worker from
Nottingham, who had never played on TV before and
was ranked number 137 in the world.
It was Manchester United vs. a side in the relegation
zone of the Conference North.
Kirk won 9-7 in perhaps the greatest upset
professional darts
has ever seen
before going on to
beat Peter Wright
in
the
fourth
round
before
finally succumbing
to Brendan Dolan.
It looks like Taylor really does
prove that form is temporary but
class, or genius, is permanent.
“He told me he’d ‘take it as a compliment. My form
has been patchy like United’s’.”
The only player below Taylor after three weeks of the
league was the equally struggling Simon Whitlock,
though illness had been plaguing the Australian in
the early weeks to add to his poor form.
But since being slain at the UK Open the old Taylor
has started to turn on the power.
He held his nerve against Dave Chisnall, breaking his
opponent’s throw in the final leg, annihilated Wes
Newton 7-1 with nearly a 107 average and prevented
old foe Raymond van Barneveld from chalking up his
first Premier League victory against him with a draw.
The two met in week four and Taylor won 7-3 with a
world class average of 104.82.
Taylor beat Robert Thornton on Judgement Night to
move up to fifth in the table, one point behind the
all important play-off places.
Yet in his three defeats to arguably the three most
in-form players in the world at the time, Taylor
averaged 99.45 against MVG who averaged a sublime
109.59; against Lewis he averaged 98.27 while
his opponent’s was 100.57, and against Wright he
averaged 101.03 compared to Wright’s 100.4.
In between the Newton and van Barneveld Premier
League matches, Taylor was runner-up in the third
Players Championship event, losing to Anderson in
the deciding leg of the final. The next day he won
the fourth event, whitewashing Ian White in the
final.
The same happened against Gary Anderson in week
His overall average for the fourth tournament was