MAY THE DARTS BE WITH YOU

Any remaining doubts about the game of darts standing as a 'proper' sport were dispelled when Emma Hughes from Oxford removed all her clothing and embarked on a minute-long streak around the Lakeside Country Club, much to the raucous delight of the assembled beered-up throng. A first for Frimley Green, it's probably fair to say that few double tops have ever been greeted with such unbridled enthusiasm at the home of darts. The very best of order ladeez 'n' gennelmen . . . game on.

For students, the infirm, the unemployed and anyone else lucky enough to have access to a television set during weekday afternoons, the annual Embassy World Darts Championship from Frimley Green has long made for compulsive viewing. A heady mix of skill and theatre, this annual sporting staple is unique in that, for 51 weeks of the year, we couldn't give a monkey's what those who participate in it get up to. For seven days each January, however, their nicknames are burned on our souls as we marvel at their skill and accuracy and renew our acquaintances with their wives, children and parents.

Aware that the sight of a procession of profoundly unattractive men throwing pointy missiles at a round board from a distance of eight feet might not necessarily make for the most riveting viewing, the BBC have successfully colluded with the powers that be in world darts to come up with an annual package of skill and theatre that is rarely less than utterly absorbing.

You can learn a lot about a man by the way he chucks an arrow under pressure, but you can learn a lot more when amiable anchor Ray Stubbs or commentator Tony Green are on hand to reveal that the unflappable tungsten titan in question is, in fact, a quantity surveyor from Ipswich whose wife Linda is a lollipop lady at the local comprehensive. And then there's his father, Les, a former county champion who can't be with us today as he's currently laid up in East Anglia with a bad dose of gout. Needless to say, we send him our best wishes.

While it's undoubtedly a coincidence that darts' Blue Riband event coincides with the British

pantomime season, its accompanying razzmatazz certainly succeeds in making it one of sport's more engrossing spectacles. Raucous crowds, effervescent MCs, extravagant light shows, ostentatious introductions and bizarrely monikered competitors of all shapes and sizes combine to lend it an appeal that captures a place in the hearts of all but the most hardened cynics. Like professional wrestling, it's largely contrived but no less entertaining a spectacle for all that.

Unfortunately for arrows, the absence of Phil Taylor from the Embassy World Championship continues to cast a shadow over events at Frimley Green. Widely regarded as the greatest player ever to toe the oche, 'The Power' has won only two of his nine world titles at The Lakeside and - in a sport governed by two different ruling bodies - it is in front of the Sky cameras at the Circus Tavern in Purfleet that he has claimed the

majority of his world titles. While the statistics prove that the Lakeside tournament is far stronger than its rival, its winner can hardly consider

himself a true champion as long as Taylor

continues to throw darts. The obvious solution, naturally, would be the staging of a head-to-head between the two world champions in order to decide the undisputed champion. Dutch star Raymond Barneveld lost a televised showdown with Taylor after winning the 1999 title, but the idea was scrapped soon afterwards.

For now, it seems, 2001 Embassy champion John 'Boy' Walton (tipped at 50/1 before the tournament by his colourful colleague and BBC pundit Bobby George) will be forced to make do with the cheque for £46,000, the magnum of champagne, the big, shiny silver trophy and the fawning

adoration of legless lushes in Dog & Duck pubs the length and breadth of Great Britain.

Jim Bowen was right - you can't beat a bit of bully.