DARTS BECOME A CRAZE IN BRITAIN

Hawke's Bay Herald-Tribune, Volume 81, Issue 83, 31 December 1937, Page 13

DARTS BECOME A CRAZE IN BRITAIN

BIG CONTESTS HELD Problem of Amateurism 1

JT IS ALREADY VERY easily the most popular indoor sport in the British Isles, so easily, indeed, that the time cannot be far distant when ite adherents will begin to claim that it should be recognised as the natiouai game — this pastime of darts, writes Denzil Batchelor in the Stydney Morn-( ing Herald. A few years ago it, was played oniy in the most broad-minded public houftes by the merest sprinkling of weeds aud bookworms untrained for the athletic rigours of shoVe ha'penny. Nouthere is uot a public ,bar betwee'i Land's End and John o' Groats, which has not got ite dart board; hardly a* inn that does not boast its team:.and no hatulet that can support existence without at least one Darts Ueagau, with weekly competitions, and, at the end of the season. a silver cup, presented pro: bably rather by the local brewers th'iu by the Bquire.

The B.E.C. presents datts talk on the air, The most popular of daily nevv«papers has its Darte Editor, who is allowed almost as mueh space as the prophet who supplies the column headid "Hints to Racegoers; " as if the writer were a. echoolmaster with all the answers clear and obvious in his head, while his xeaders were so many pupilsl who had to be eneouraged not to *«o slack in their homework. Thero is an •exeellent weekly paper devoted exclusively to darts news. There are audiences assembled over a thousand strong to watch local championship- matches ia the North of England, "Wales, which started the game with a single board in Cardiff, now has fifty thousand registered players, over throa thousand competitors in its annual ontiona] championship and is already clamouring for intornational matches with England. The more advanced thinkers amonL London publicans are building dart.s and pariours where once their ancestors planned billiard rooms. A popular detective story writer has receutty published the first murder mystery with A darts'- bar background. The gaaw is i

not confined to men only. There are women 's leagues all over the country, and the Suzanne Lenglen of darts, Mrs JVtorgan, recently won the Winchester Area Championship in a big tournament promoted by a Sunday newspaper. The popularity of the craze has extended to the smallest towns and villages. The little town of High Wvcombe has recently proclaimed that it now boasts well over a thousand Leaguo players; and how impressive this js can be judgod from tho fact that until this announcement I.for ons would not have liked to declare positively that High Wycombe had a four-figure population. Already the game is threatened with a crisis. The darts world is split into two camps, divided on the vital issuo: Should cash prizes be allowed in. darts? The M.C.C. of darts whatever that controlling body may be, will soon have to pronounce whether tho game is going to follow the lead of golf, where" ama^ teurs may meet professionals withou't, loss of status, or of tennis-, where class distinction is jealously preserved. Enough (at least) has been said to emphasise the natjon-wide popularity of the new craze. Two points reinain' wortliy of consideration. How has darts come to reach this pitcli of popularity, and is the game siifficiently good intrinsically to warrant it and to make it likely that darts will soon become as popular intornationally, as it- now is iu Great Britain? There can be no question as to the origin of the sudden rise to pe- , pularit^ of tht game. Dart boatds k*ve

hung neglected in English inns for years past. There was no need to on* courage men to enter the bar parlour with the ldre of darts. The inn was the poor man's club, the only meetingplace he knew; and there were no other attractions to offer him as au alternative way of spending his evening. To-day if he has a couple of shillings iu his pocket, he has a choice of entertainments which a millionaire of an earlier generation might have envied. There is the ubiquitious cinema. Lon/ don offers over 10 flesh-and-blood thear tres, "and all provincial towns of any size offer at least three. There are gtoyhound raees, motor-cycle races, smallear races, all to be seen nightly. Tliera are .boxing matches and wrestling contests, where teams of two giants aside oppose each other in sixty-minute Donnybrooks. There is the entertainament offered by the wireless. You have lo ■ promise a man a lot more fun than hei will find in a glass of beer to lure him to spond his evening in a bar nowadays. Recognising this, the brewers have rediscovered the game of darts. It is the great brewing companies which have boomed and boosted darts to its present importanee in the scheme of things. Tho- first and biggest loagues were founded in their namos, some of the richest prizes are presented directly by them, while most of tlie mifior ones come indirectly from them througii the licensees of tied houses. The brewers invented darts as a popular sport, and to-day it is so popular that it would not. be an exaggeration io say tjiat most of the inhabitanrs of tho ! public bar regard the inn j>ri©£rp£ M ,

a daris club, rather than as a piaccj where beer is to be drunk. The fact that the game has "caught on" on its own, merits (and not as ^ mere accessory to drink) is plainly evldent from the number of Temperanco Dart Leagues now being founded all over the British Isles. There are also to-day tens of thousands of private houses with their own darts boards on which family games are enjoyed every evening. The truth is, I am assured, that the game is good enough to deserve its popularity. Anyone who has thrown darts (they 'can be feathered or paper tailed to taste) the regulation nine feec six inches cannot fail to recognise its fascinatiOn. The various types of game that can be played provides scope for Ihe humblest talent or the most disciplined virtuosity. You can gcore willynilly in the variant called "cricket" wliere beginners luck utay help you to victory, or you may figlit the stern dutl of "301 up, beginning anq ending with Doubles," when uothing but sheer Skill and stern training can count in. the long Tun. The finish of a tightfought game with both players stviving to fling their dart into a "double," a wired-in' space about an inch by a quarter of an inch, can be as enthraning as any gpeotacle athletics has to offer. I watched a champion from Hampshire who had come all the way to a Snack Bar in Ben Jonson Road in London to uphold the honour of his county in a sort of Darts Cotmtry Week. Mr Arthur ("Pinkie") .Waibrook, like all serious darts players uses his own darts and carried them from inn to inn aua county to county. He has been plaving for six years, and by now, I should say, he could hit a threepenny bit ou a darts board twice in three tlirows. "They say the smallest amount of drink unsteadies a man's nerves and puts his eye out," he said to me, "Ti should like to see anyone with cooler nerves or a steadier eye than champions who have played in bar pariours fjr