Split in darts

The split in darts refers to an acrimonious dispute between top professional darts players and the game's governing body which began in 1992 and resulted in the formation of a new organisation to arrange tournaments - including a second version of the World Professional Darts Championship. The effect of this split is visible many years later, as there are still two pools of players, two organisations and two world championships - the original British Darts Organisation (BDO) and the newer breakaway Professional Darts Corporation.

Before the split

The British Darts Organisation (BDO) was formed in 1973. They became the governing body of the game in the United Kingdom and would organise darts events for grassroots players right through to the best players in the world.

Darts first appeared on British television in 1962 when Westward Television broadcast the Westward TV Invitational to the south-west of England. In 1970, ITV broadcast the News of the World Championship and from 1972 the Indoor League, which featured a darts tournament.

Gradually televised events began to appear more regularly. ITV broadcast the World Masters, British Matchplay, the World Matchplay, the World Cup and other International competitions - usually on its Saturday afternoon sports anthology show World of Sport.

When the World Championship began in 1978, the BBC picked up the event and also went on to cover the Bullseye Darts Championship, British Gold Cup, British Professional Championship and others in later years.

The mass of coverage and amount of prize money in the game led to several players turning professional - now able to make a full-time living from the game.

Decline in the game

Darts players were allowed to drink alcohol and smoke cigarettes on the stage during matches, a reflection of the game's roots in British pubs. The players were famously mocked on a Not the Nine O'Clock News sketch in 1980 right at the height of darts' popularity. Whilst the sketch did not put any immediate halt to darts' popularity, it reflected the detrimental image of the game and may have contributed to its long-term decline in future years.

After the peak of the darts boom was reached in 1983, professional darts in Britain began to haemorrhage sponsors and lose television coverage. By the end of 1983, the British Gold Cup (BBC), Butlins Grand Masters (ATV) and British Matchplay (ITV) had all ended, and in 1985 ITV decided to cancel its World of Sport show which had covered darts on a regular basis. ITV continued to show darts as programmes in their own right - but eventually withdrew from the game after the 1988 World Matchplay and their final tournament was the World Masters in 1988. The BBC pulled the plug on the British Professional Championship in 1988. Also, the ITV regional channels that covered local darts tournaments cancelled the tournaments throughout 1988 after being held for the last time. As a result, 1989 saw a very drastic slump in the amount of darts seen on TV, down to just one tournament, the world championship.

The BDO banned alcohol on stage during all matches from the 1989 World Championship, but the game maintained a poor image to sponsors.

Players' unrest

Many players had turned professional during darts' peak years in the 1980s, and the big sudden drop in the amount of darts television coverage in 1989 left them with very little prize money to play for. It also meant a lack of exposure, which would make it very tough for them to make a living from exhibition matches. The top players felt that not enough was being done by the governing body, the BDO, to encourage new sponsors into their sport and television coverage should be greater than just one event per year.

After over 3 years of internal pressure from pressure group, the Darts Council, failed, 16 professional players, including every previous BDO World Champion who was still active in the game, created their own darts organisation originally named the World Darts Council (WDC) in January 1992.

They wanted to appoint a public relations consultant to improve the image of the game and also staged their first televised event in 1992 (the Lada UK Masters on Anglia Television).

The 1993 World Championship

The badges worn by WDC players at the 1993 World Championship

The 1993 Embassy World Championship was the last time all the players played in one unified competition. The WDC players wore their new insignia on their sleeves during the tournament, but were told to remove them by the BDO. The WDC players decided that if they were not going to be recognised by the BDO they would no longer play in the Embassy tournament. The BDO did not allow the WDC players to set up their own tournaments and the players decided to go their own way.

The "defectors"

Satellite broadcaster Sky Sports, which had not existed during the decline of the game, was beginning to become a viable option, following the creation of football's Premier League and signed a deal to cover exclusively three WDC tournaments each year.

Originally 16 players "defected" from the BDO to form the WDC - Phil Taylor, Dennis Priestley, Rod Harrington, Alan Warriner, Peter Evison, Ritchie Gardner, Jocky Wilson, Eric Bristow, Keith Deller, John Lowe, Bob Anderson, Cliff Lazarenko, Kevin Spiolek, Jamie Harvey, Mike Gregory and Chris Johns. The list included every previous World Champion who was still active in the game - only Leighton Rees (who had already retired) was absent.

However, Johns, and later, Gregory, had a change of heart and returned to the BDO - but the remaining 14 players remained united and managed to stick together to get their own version of the World Championship off the ground for 1994. The BDO event continued with a largely unknown field - although Bobby George produced a resurgent performance to reach the final. The BDO held onto their contract with the BBC to show the event on terrestrial television and began to bring through a new generation of players.

Court action

In April 1993, after a meeting in Finchley, the BDO took the step to ban the rebel players from BDO tournaments and from playing in county darts, and even threatened to ban any player who participated in exhibition events with WDC players. This led to a protracted four year legal battle between the players and the BDO which would incur large costs for both sides.

The two bodies reached an out-of-court settlement on 30 June 1997 in the form of a Tomlin order.

The BDO recognized the WDC and agreed that all players shall have the freedom of choice as to which open events they wish to play in. The WDC dropped its claim to be a world governing body and renamed itself the Professional Darts Corporation (PDC). The PDC accepted / recognized the WDF as the governing body for the Sport of Darts worldwide, and the BDO the governing body for darts in the UK. The stated purpose of the agreement was to promote the freedom of individual darts players to participate freely in open competition.

Player eligibility

Despite the Tomlin Order, eligibility for tournaments is somewhat complicated and possibly controversial. Initially some BDO players took the opportunity to play in the PDC World Matchplay between 1998 and 2001 - but entry was later restricted to members of the Professional Dart Players Association, which looks after PDC players. Most PDC tournaments are now usually restricted to members of the PDPA.

To play in a BDO / WDF tournament, a player must agree to comply with the rules of the 1997 Tomlin Order and remain eligible for the BDO World Masters and World Championship, which effectively means not become a member of the PDPA. Players therefore usually have to choose whether to be affiliated to the PDC or the BDO and stay within the jurisdiction of that organisation.

However, there are notable exceptions. PDPA Players Championships and Open events often allow residents of the host country to participate regardless of being a PDPA member or not. This leads to anomalies such as Michael van Gerwen winning the PDC Open Holland in 2006 whilst being a BDO player at the time.

Another exception is made for major Dutch televised tournaments. They were previously staged under BDO / WDF qualification rules, but when the most famous Dutch player Raymond van Barneveld switched to the PDC, the tournament organisers insisted on inviting PDC players. An agreement was made with the BDO to allow a number of PDC wildcards for each event. Three more top Dutch players joined the PDC in January 2007 which adds more confusion to player eligibility rules for these events. (see International Darts League and World Darts Trophy)

The Grand Slam of Darts (organised by the PDC) is the first major tournament staged in the United Kingdom to feature players from both sides of the darting divide. Inaugurated in 2007 it also featured a return to darts broadcasting for ITV and in 2008 was broadcast exclusively live on ITV4. Players who reached the latter stages of all the major PDC and BDO tournaments over a two-year period were invited, and all but one (the then BDO World Champion Martin Adams) accepted the invite - Phil Taylor won the competition in 2007, 2008, 2009 and 2011. BDO member Scott Waites won the title in 2010.

Standing of organisations

Opinion is split as to which is the most prestigious title to win. The prize money is far greater in the PDC World Championship and the field contains arguably more than half of the best players in the world. However the British Darts Organisation title has been in existence since 1978 and is generally better known to the UK public due to its coverage on the BBC.

At the time of the split itself all the previous World Champions and top ranked players left to join the WDC/PDC. The WDC/PDC stayed a "closed shop" for several years which protected the exposure of the players who made the switch. The World Championship featured a group stage which guaranteed at least two television appearances for its players. Several of these players including Jocky Wilson, who retired shortly after the split in 1995, Eric Bristow, Keith Deller and Cliff Lazarenko had all been in a downward spiral of form for a few years. The group stage was scrapped for the 1999 championship, and the tournament has been conducted in a single elimination format since then with the number of participants gradually increasing.

The BDO began to bring through several players from their county system which continued to improve the standard of the organisation which had been decimated by the split. Nevertheless, a good number of professionals including top players Ronnie Baxter, Wayne Mardle, Chris Mason, Kevin Painter and former BDO World Champions John Part, Steve Beaton, Richie Burnett, Raymond van Barneveld, Jelle Klaasen and Anastasia Dobromyslova have switched and further increased the standard in the Professional Darts Corporation.

There is no definitive World Champion in the game, although Phil Taylor has won 15 world titles (13 PDC and 2 BDO before the split). Taylor has also twice beaten the incumbent BDO World Champion in the only ever head-to-head challenge matches. However, the existence of the two events still leads to uncertainty as to how many titles he would have won had the game been unified - for instance Ted Hankey produced a devastating run of form in the 2000 BDO World Championship, destroying the field and might have delivered a sterner test than Taylor received that year. Former BDO stalwarts John Part and Raymond van Barneveld have won the PDC World Championship having previously won the BDO version demonstrating that players from the one system do have the ability to win the other world championship. In addition, BDO World Champion Mark Webster defeated PDC World Champion John Part 10–2 in legs in the second round of the 2008 Grand Slam of Darts.

It wasn't until the 2002 PDC World Darts Championship that the winners cheque and total prize fund of the PDC version overtook the BDO event but by the 2010 and 2011 PDC World Darts Championship there is now a record prize fund of £1,000,000 with the winners receiving a record £200,000. The 2010 BDO World Darts Championship prize fund was £325,000 with the winner Martin Adams taking £100,000.

PDC bid to take over BDO

On 21 October 2009, Barry Hearn made a bid of £1 million to purchase the BDO. It was the first time that a formal offer had been made public to end the 17-year split between the two organisations. However, later in the day, BDO founder Olly Croft rejected the proposal. A few months after the takeover offer and in the aftermath of the two organisations' 2010 World Championships, it was revealed and understood that the county organisations had asked the BDO board to consider the offer more seriously.

Almost two years later, Croft was voted off the BDO board at their 2011 AGM ending 38 years as the main figurehead of the Organisation.