SURREY DARTS

by Martin Cullip 

As appearing in the July Issue of Dart World

Rivals Can’t Solve Jimmy’s Riddle

When Rudyard Kipling finished his well-known poem, “If”, with the line, “And – Which is more – You’ll be a Man my son!”, he could have misspelt the word ‘Man’ & made an accurate appraisal of the current situation in the Surrey Super League, as Ditton FC’s Jimmy Mann must truly feel that his “…is the Earth and everything that’s in it” after making a clean sweep of all the Honours at the Finals Night.

The League’s showpiece event of the Year became a ‘Jimmy Mann admiration society’ gathering as he took the Triples, Pairs & Singles Crowns in front of an appreciative full house at Walton Working Mens Club.

It was a gruelling schedule for Cheam-based Jimmy as he began the night at 8:30pm with the Singles Quarter-Finals, and he was involved constantly from then on, only finally being allowed to rest at 10:45pm after clinching the last of his three Titles!

The Prize Money awarded in this year’s League increased once again this year, with just over £4,300 being handed out to the lucky winners, and a brand new Trophy was unveiled for the Singles. ‘The Prism Installations Cup’ was donated by Salfords player Darren Gale, and its presentation capped off the night on what is becoming a very popular end of season event in its second year at its new home, Walton.

The League’s contact at the Club is Committee member Roy Turner, and his immense efforts in making us feel welcome have made for a highly successful two years thus far for which we are all very grateful. However, he wasn’t afforded much gratitude by Jimmy Mann, as the Walton player was cruelly whitewashed in the Quarter Final to begin Jimmy’s ruthless march to the Treble.

A successful Pairs Semi-Final with Lionel Sams followed for Jimmy, before Surrey Mens Team Manager Keith Benson gave him his toughest test of the night in a five leg thriller. A 13 dart Final leg for Mann sent the veteran Benson back to the retirement home with his Horlicks & Hearing Aid, and ensured that the Ditton player’s marathon on the night would culminate in all three stage Finals.

Last year’s Triples Winners from Croydon’s the Golden Lion, Ray Smith, Gary Bullen & Gary Creamer, were edged out 3-2 by Mann, Sams & Jason Roberts; and Mann & Sams then took the Pairs with a 3-1 victory over Dave Askew & Tony Denman.

All that was left for Jimmy’s clean sweep was the Singles Final against Walton Snooker’s John Watson, but by then, so many in the capacity crowd wanted to see the Treble being achieved, that Watson must have felt he was climbing the steps to the guillotine as he took the stage against a now very well-practiced Mann.

Watson has had a very fine season, with some good PDC results throughout the year, and although he performed to his usual high standard, it was Jimmy’s night and 14, 15 & 18 dart legs crowned a magnificent display from the young star with a 31.98 average & another stunning whitewash.

This is only Jimmy Mann’s third Super League season, but in a very short space of time, he has risen from local leagues to the County A Team & now sits at the top table of Surrey Darts … oh, and he beat someone called Phil Taylor in an exhibition the week before Finals Night too! Coincidentally, Surrey are in the process of holding Trials to find the next batch of Youth players to bring through the ranks, a process that has proved very successful in the past, and with Jimmy still in his twenties, his success is a fine example of what can be achieved with talent & a little determination … in fact, to paraphrase Kipling “If you can keep your head while all about you are losing theirs …” YOU too could be a Mann my Son!

Singles: 1 (£250) Jimmy Mann, 2 (£125) John Watson, 3-4 (£50) Keith Benson, Kenny Winter, 5-8 Garry Bravery, Paul Ardley, Roy Turner, Ritchie Gardner.

Pairs: 1 (£220) Jimmy Mann & Lionel Sams, 2 (£110) Dave Askew & Tony Denman, 3-4 (£45) Aaron Turner & Ritchie Gardner, Peter Arnold & Jon Stephenson.

Triples: 1 (£175) Jimmy Mann, Lionel Sams & Jason Roberts, 2 (£85) Ray Smith, Gary Bullen & Gary Creamer, 3-4 (£35) Peter Arnold, Jon Stephenson & Ray Elnaugh; Dave Norton, Phil Smith & Mick Campion.

The Reebok Stadium Massacre!

It would seem that there is one Competition above all others on which the dart players of Surrey have set their sights in the last two years, the Budweiser UK Open, which was held from the 4th to the 6th June.

In what is undoubtedly going to become an annual occurrence, a considerable group of Surrey players travelled up to the Reebok Stadium having successfully negotiated the tough qualification process (what IS the collective noun for dart players? ‘A Gaggle’ as in geese? ‘A Murder’ as in crows? May I suggest ‘An Excuse’ as is proffered when they lose?).

In fact, there were so many on the road for this year’s event that maybe next time round we could hire a Minibus to take them all up together & we could deck it out in Surrey Blue & Yellow flags, with slogans scrawled on the side as in ‘The Italian Job’. We could call it ‘The Reebok Job’ with messages such as ‘We’re gonna give ‘em a right shoe-ing’ & ‘Oi! Taylor! On yer Nike!’ lovingly painted on the bodywork.

However, many in number they may have been, but successful they, unfortunately, weren’t, with all but one failing to reach the Sunday & most not even managing to win a match. It was akin to the fortunes of British players at Wimbledon & all that was needed was a ‘The Sun’ style sinking flag to remind us of how quickly the losses were happening.

Sunbury-based player Alan Caves was OUR Tim Henman, reaching the last 16 before bowing out to Alan Warriner 3-8, but he was the exception as apart from Ricky Blay, Lionel Sams & Matt Clark, who all won one match, the others all fell at the first hurdle.

Spike Harris, John Watson & Richie Blake were all competing in their first UK Open Finals & all failed to make the second round, although Spike pushed Ian Lever all the way to the Final leg. Dave Askew also failed to find his true form, losing in the Third Round, his first match, 4-8 to eventual Semi-Finalist Steve Beaton.
OK, A Surrey-based player wasn’t able to take any of the major prizes, but I think that if the UK Open operated a ‘Fair Play’ award like football, we could boast a candidate in Steve Parsons. Genuine nice-guy Steve was drawn against Les Fitton in his Third Round match, but ‘The Natural’ didn’t show in time & was threatened with expulsion from the competition. Steve, however, intervened & allowed Fitton the chance to play the match; a chance Les took emphatically by beating Parsons 8-0! Now there’s gratitude! Hmmm … considering the difference between the Third & Fourth rounds was £500, would YOU have been so generous?

Of course, the fact that there were so few successes does nothing to belittle the achievement of reaching the Reebok extravaganza in the first place and I’m sure they’ll all be battling to qualify for the ‘FA Cup of Darts’ next year, to be part of such a jaw-droppingly atmospheric tournament again, if nothing else!

You may remember that in ‘The Italian Job’, they needed three Mini Coopers to haul home the loot … unfortunately, Surrey’s production of ‘The Reebok Job’ this year only required one Smart car! Let’s hope we’ll be requisitioning a Transit Van for the UK Open 2005.

Promotion Hopes Bucks Fizz-le Out

After the disappointments of the previous two games against London & Sussex, our Premier Division promotion hopes had all but fizzled out before the trip to Buckinghamshire for the Final BICC fixture, but there was still hope that a miracle may occur … well, we did OUR bit!

Surrey enjoyed a superb 24-15 win over Bucks, & the text messages & phone calls were flying back & forth between sunny Great Yarmouth, where London were facing Norfolk, & our venue, trying to establish the consequences of the results as they happened.

Unfortunately for us, London were able to record a draw despite strong resistance from our East Anglian allies & a possible return to the top flight was, perhaps unsurprisingly, not to be.

However, third place is an incredible achievement for Surrey as we have been dogged all season by a lack of playing personnel (remember Northumberland when your friendly neighbourhood Darts World correspondent was 5 minutes away from playing?) & this weakness was again evident in Bucks as a couple of supporters were drafted in by Mens Team Manager ‘Old Faithful’ (Old being the operative word) Keith Benson. In fact, had we had a coach driver (Surrey funds have been so devastated by a surfeit of distant away games this season that no travel could be afforded for such a relatively local match), I believe even HE would have been considered for the team, so stretched have been our resources this year.

It was a morale-boosting win for the Team as first the Ladies B registered a healthy 4-2 win with another Lady of the Match from Gill “Shep” Shephard (17.28). Gillian, as she hates to be known, answered the call, made at the Surrey AGM last August, for more players to be available for the County side & reluctantly put herself forward. She has been nothing short of a star during this campaign & has taken three Lady of the Match trophies home with her, as well as cracking hundreds of gags throughout the year … some of them were even funny!

The Mens B drew 6-6 with a Man of the Match game from Steve Lovett (26.84), no doubt our find of the season after Garry Bravery recommended him to Benson as a possible recruit for the County, prompting the legendary line from Benson “Garry, do you know any other dart players who are more consistent than you?”

The Ladies A carried on the good work by drawing 3-3, with Apylee Jones (23.78) yet again excelling, although she had to pull out all the stops to overcome Bucks’ Karen Lan (21.58) after going two legs down.

Performance of the weekend, though, has to be the Mens A, who have battled well all year without getting results that they sometimes deserved, but a stunning 8-4 victory was just reward for the effort expended throughout the campaign & this match was special in that no player was seen to hide, as the averages show. Garry Bravery (30.08) showed his full potential, and good wins from Captain Gary Creamer (28.68), Jimmy Mann (27.40), Gary Ledger (25.90) & Roger “You’re never alone with a gnome” Kitching (25.86) helped the side to one of the sweetest results of the year. Considering Andy Gillam (27.38) & Steve Lovett (24.51) can feel hard done by to lose, just shows you that the team was running like a finely-tuned Lexus that day.

It may be a shame that Surrey couldn’t bounce straight back up to the Premier this year, but there are many that say (quietly) that we perhaps aren’t ready yet for the trials of the big guns of the BICC. They may well have a point, and so it is that we will be back in action in Division 1 next time with the hope that, despite depleted numbers, we will be capable of winning more than a few weekends. Who knows? A few more new faces & we could pose a bright, fresh challenge come September. Benson will certainly be pleased with THAT … he hasn’t been linked with the words bright & fresh since 1942!

Val Porter - Obituary

It’s with great sadness that I have to report that Val Porter died on Monday 26th April. Val had been ill for about six months with Cancer. She was a popular player in the Surrey Ladies Super League for the Misfitz team who play out of Walton Working Mens Club. Val had being playing darts for about eight years for various teams and was well-known on the local circuit as well as in the Super League. Val was a special lady and will be sorely missed by all her team-mates, as well as all that knew her and whose lives she enriched.