1982 - sunspots I reckon

Let me know if you see a pattern emerging here:

Snooker: World champion 1981, 1983, 1984: Steve Davis, the undisputed world number one and the man the crowds loved to hate (supporting the underdog as ever). World champion 1982: maverick drunken Celtic "people's champion" Alex Higgins.




Darts: World champion 1981, 1983, 1984: Eric Bristow, the undisputed world number one and the man the crowds loved to hate (supporting the underdog as ever). World champion 1982: maverick drunken Celtic "people's champion" Jocky Wilson.



Tennis: Wimbledon champion 1981, 1983, 1984: John McEnroe, the undisputed world number one and the man the crowds loved to hate (supporting the underdog as ever). Wimbledon champion 1982: maverick non-drunken possibly of Celtic descent "people's champion" Jimmy Connors.


I was pretty pleased with this observation when I came up with it the other day. There's only one problem with it, on closer observation of the facts: Eric Bristow didn't win the world darts championship in 1983, he lost, famously, in the deciding set of the final to the unseeded Keith Deller. I should know this, because I watched the whole thing live on TV (though admittedly I was only 13 at the time). Two things stick in the mind: firstly Deller used, uniquely I think, spring-loaded darts, i.e. the point retracted into the shaft (ooer missus) on impact with the board, and secondly he won by hitting a 138 checkout after Bristow had spurned an opportunity to go for the bull, and instead played what he though was the percentage option and hit 18 to leave himself double 16 next shot. Unfortunately he never got one...

Two more fascinating darts facts before I drop the subject until next year: Eric Bristow was rumoured to have six toes on each foot, and it was speculated this helped his balance at the oche, and secondly Jocky Wilson was (and is) married to a Scottish-Argentinian woman called Malvina, which caused a certain amount of friction around the time of his first World Championship win in 1982, as it coincided with the Falklands War. Rather like being married to a woman called Dresden or Luftwaffe during World war II, I should think.