Darts analysis: The transformation of the sport over the last decade

The sport of darts has seen a dramatic shift in popularity over the last decade, and this is down to a number of things.

The introduction of Sky Sports’ stranglehold, and Barry Hearn’s change of target audience are considerable factors in this change.

However, the sheer expansion of talent over the last five years cannot be understated, with names such as Michael Smith, Luke Littler and of course cool hand Luke Humphries.

Sports News Blitz’s Joe Grainger looks at the rise in popularity of the greatest ‘pub sport’ on the planet…

Darts becoming mainstream

There are many reasons over the last decade as to why the darts following has transformed.

In 1992 Sky Sports signed a deal to exclusively cover three PDC tournaments each year. To capitalise on its investment, the channel introduced a number of new techniques to make the coverage more interesting for armchair fans.

Sky has whole games televised unlike the BDO’s highlight-based shows on the BBC.

Sky changed the game by having breaks in play for commercials.

Planet Funk's 2000 single "Chase the Sun" is played in the auditorium, and it has become a cult track amongst darts fans, who tend to dance along to the tune during the breaks.

This component is vital to the changing landscape of the audience darts and the PDC are trying to target.

The singalong crowds who are encouraged to party and play dress up whilst spectating is a far cry from the traditional fanbase the sport had in the 1980’s.

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Darts 40 years ago was a ‘pub- game’ that was to be observed and admired quietly and respectfully.

Since the birth of the ‘made for television’ darts era, crowds behave a lot more like football fans, with shouting and chanting being a common occurrence.

This means that the target audience was opened up to these types of sports fans, meaning the game of darts became a much bigger attraction to the wide, sports-loving UK population.

This has been capitalised by players such as Stephen Bunting and his walkout song ‘Titanium’ becoming a singalong at most venues he now plays at, as well as clips being shared on social media, showing how nowadays darts players can be held in such a high regard and have huge followings for all sorts of reasons.

The PDC World Darts Championship is the biggest darting event of the calendar year, and takes place over the festive period, which was a very clever business decision.

Most sports fans, who loosely follow the sport of darts, will watch darts religiously over a 25- day period and has become part of the Christmas itinerary in this country.

The 2024 PDC Darts World Championship final between Luke Littler and Luke Humphries was watched by a record 4.8million people on TV, and that figure is growing every year.

Something that can be inferred from the stat above is the viewership that has come with the emergence of teenage talent Luke Littler.

At the Worlds last year, he took the tournament by storm and blew very good pros away, and humiliated top names in the game such as Raymond Van Barneveld and Rob Cross (both former winners of the competition) on his route to the final.

He massively caught the eye of the viewing public, and he was very quickly pushed into stardom, something that is unusual for darts players.

His fame and success has not waned through the year, with victories in the Premier League, and in the Grand Slam. Having said this, he will not find an easy route to every final.

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Pool of competitiveness

In the 1990’s and the 2000’s, the PDC struggled to find a strong enough opponent for the greatest of all time, Phil Taylor.

This meant the sport became uninteresting for many years as he won 14 World Titles out of a possible 18 (1995-2013).

However, in recent years there have been seven different winners since 2014, meaning the game has become a lot more competitive and enjoyable to watch.

The talent within the game has also stepped up a notch over the last 10 years.

This can be seen with the amount of nine darters hit in the last 10 years in PDC competitions (374, with 55 so far this year - the most annually in PDC history), compared to 137 between 1994-2013.

All of these statistics make more enjoyable and dramatic encounters, whether they are being watched at home or in person.

The epitome of drama and sheer talent was displayed in the 2023 PDC World Championship Final between Michael van Gerwen and eventual winner Michael Smith.

In the third leg of the second set, both players had the chance to hit a nine darter on the biggest stage of them all, and that chance was eventually taken by Michael Smith, which then set the tone for the quality of the rest of the match.

The sport has grown exponentially over the last decade, and due to the components of social media, the growing masses of talent and the stranglehold Sky has, darts will only continue to grow.

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