STING IN THE TAYL
The Power stunned in his final match as Cross wins crown in emphatic fashion
PHIL TAYLOR’S bid for a Hollywood finale to his glittering career was shot down in a blaze of hot Cross bungs.
And as Rob Cross became the finest purveyor of arrows from Hastings since King Harold copped one in the eye from William the Conqueror in 1066, a shooting star was born on the oche at London’s Alexandra Palace.
In his 21st final, and last competitive match before he retires today at the age of 57, Taylor crashed 7-2 in the final of the William Hill PDC World Championship.
If destiny had smiled on the Power’s passage to the final, the final curtain toppled on him like a ton of bricks.
Instead of the Beverly Hills climax he craved, 16-times world champion Taylor got a Muswell Hill send-off into the sunset. Cross, 27, need feel no embarrassment about desecrating a legend’s swansong with a rout. He’s not the man who shot Bambi – he’s the former electrician who is suddenly the brightest spark in the pack.
Cross inflicted the heaviest defeat in the final since Taylor thrashed Raymond van Barneveld 7-1 nine years ago, and his performance was phenomenal, averaging a fabulous 107.67 and knocking out 60 per cent of his doubles as if he was shelling peas.
This was the first time Taylor had ever played Cross – and he will be grateful it was the last.
He won just 10 legs all night, and when he salvaged the small mercy of the fourth set, he even decorated the hollow triumph with a playful middle finger at one of his entourage in the VIP seats.
For Cross, life will never be the same. Married at 21, and a father of three, he didn’t have two plug sockets to rub together 12 months ago.
But none of the shooting stars which are supposed to fill our skyline this week will be brighter than this chap.
His sudden-death semifinal thriller, which toppled reigning champion Michael van Gerwen well past midnight on Saturday, was the most pulsating duel between two slapheads since Phil and Grant Mitchell fought over Sharon Watts’ affections on East-Enders. And now he has climbed the PDC charts faster than any Christmas phenomenon since Band Aid.
Taylor could only praise him afterwards. “He was like me 25 years ago, relentless,” said Taylor. “Darts has got another animal on its hands. Now all the other top players have a real problem.
“It was like an old man against a young man. He was too good. I don’t have the energy to beat players like him any more.”
From the outset, Cross wasn’t falling for any of Taylor’s mind games. Cross refused to be intimidated by Taylor’s £7.3million career prize money, his 102 TV titles and his attempts to unsettle him with eye contact on stage. Just as Taylor had ambushed his mentor Eric Bristow 6-1 in the final as a 125-1 outsider 28 years ago to win the first of his 16 world titles, Cross simply refused to bow and curtsey to a legend.
When the raced into a three-set lead, taking out 167 and 153 as if he was peeling a tangerine, Taylor was staring at the unthinkable humiliation of bowing out with a 7-0 whitewash.
Although Taylor stopped the rot by taking the fourth set, the belief drained out of him like bathwater after pulling the plug in the very next leg. Instead of blowing the roof off Ally Pally with a sensational nine-darter, he wired double 12.
And as if to prove this was not to be the Power’s night, he scattered his next half-dozen arrows across the board like a bag of spanners falling out of the loft – and Cross stole the leg with exemplary ruthlessness.
History will not judge Taylor on an old stager’s last stand falling horribly flat.
Roger Federer can keep his 19 Grand Slam titles. Jack Nicklaus can keep his 18 Majors. Don Bradman can keep his Test batting average of 99.94.
The Power’s achievements, and especially his longevity, will stand the test of time against all of them.
But when Cross took out 140 on double 16, the electrician who caused a huge short-circuit on the Power’s grid became the new monarch in the town where King Harold snuffed it.
The king is dead, long the king.