Sky Sports expert Rod Harrington picks his favourite World Darts Championship moments
Wednesday 10 December 2014 12:42, UK
It is almost 20 years since Rod Harrington appeared in a World Championship final, and during that time he has watched darts go from strength to strength.
Live World Darts Championship
The 1995 finalist has since swapped the oche for the commentary box and he will be back at Alexandra Palace later this month for the start of the 2015 World Darts Championships.
The action begins on December 18 and you can watch it live on Sky Sports Darts. As well as live coverage from Ally Pally, Sky Sports Darts will screen a host of programmes and features, including a fascinating documentary with reigning champion Michael van Gerwen.
Sky Sports expert Harrington has witnessed an array of dramatic darting moments down through the years, and we asked him to select his favourite World Championship memories.
2007: A fitting farewell
The one game that I’ll never forget is Raymond van Barneveld against Phil Taylor in 2007, the last final at the Circus Tavern. It went to the very last leg and the poignant thing about that game is it changed the way we went for bullseyes in sudden death.
It went to the last leg, meaning they had to throw for bull with the closest throwing first. Taylor stepped up and put a dart just below the bullseye, and then went to retrieve his dart. But back then, Barney was allowed to leave his opponent's dart in the board and that’s what he told Phil, who knew that Barney was going to bounce his dart off his and into the bull. That’s exactly what happened, Barney threw first and went on to win his first PDC World Championship.
The actual game was the best final I’ve ever seen. It went backwards and forwards, with Phil taking a good lead and Barney fighting back. But the ironic thing about that is I was managing Colin Lloyd at the time, and he had four separate darts to beat Barney when they met in the second round. He was 3-0 up in sets but unable to close it out.
2006: Manley oversteps the mark
Certain things happen that stick in your mind and one of those was the 2006 quarter-final between Adrian Lewis and Peter Manley. We all used to be guilty of a bit of gamesmanship back in the day but Manley stepped over the mark, and kept talking when Lewis was throwing. Adrian was a young man and didn’t know how to cope with it.
The Sky Sports cameras are pretty good at picking up things and they knew something was going on, so they focused a camera on Manley’s mouth. And you could Manley saying to Lewis, ‘Give it large!’ Adrian had enough of it and walked off, and Peter turns around asking what had happened. Unfortunately for him, the camera had caught him hook, line and sinker!
Gamesmanship is a part of every sport and many people do it to a small degree, but Peter Manley, as he always did, stepped over the line.
2013: 17 perfect darts
You always look at great things that happen and Michael van Gerwen missing double 12 for a second nine-darter on the trot, that would have been an unbelievable feat.
I was commentating on the semi-final for Sky 3D and the atmosphere was incredible. The crowd were still on their feet celebrating Van Gerwen’s nine-darter when he fired in two more maximums!
No-one had ever struck nine-darters in successive legs, and Van Gerwen was milimetres away from creating history.
2008: Shepherd stuns Ally Pally
Kirk Shepherd was the most u
