Firefighting Christmas for darts hero Soots

ANGUS darts hero Alan Soutar will fight fires in Dundee at Christmas – just 24 hours after an explosive PDC World Darts Championship win.

Soutar, pictured, jetted back to Scotland this morning to begin his work at Dundee Kingsway Fire Station at 6pm.

The Arbroath hero will work back-to-back 14-hour and 16-hour shifts just a day after claiming a £25,000 prize for his stunning 144 check-out win over Mensur Suljovic.

Soots fought back from two sets down to win a tie-break 6-4 with two treble 20s and a double 12.

That sealed a third round tie with Jose de Sousa at Alexandra Palace.

But he could now face fires or road traffic accidents before returning to London for the third round on December 29.

“I’m going to be working 30 hours over the next two days,” said Soutar.

“I now have a 14-hour nightshift on Christmas Eve and a 16-hour nightshift on Christmas Day at the fire station.

“Christmas is a total unknown quantity.

“I’ve been in major house fires on Christmas morning and road traffic collisions on Christmas Eve and Boxing Day.

“You just don’t know what’s going to happen.

“We pray in our jobs we’re not going into anything because that’s someone else’s life or trouble.

“Hopefully, I have a couple of quiet shifts and everyone is safely with their families enjoying Christmas.

“Look, it’s my job. Whatever happens, happens and we go and deal with it.

“My big issue is swaps again. I’m supposed to be back in work on December 30 and I don’t know what’s going to happen with this tournament.

“The guys will expect cakes. I suppose I can afford some from Clark’s.”

Meanwhile, Soots admits he feared he was out as he lost the first two sets.

Suljovic missed eight match darts before Soutar silenced a partisan English crowd with his winning throw.

“I felt at 2-0 I was going to lose,” added Soutar.

“What are you thinking at that point?

“It’s ‘what time is my Uber booked to take me to the airport tomorrow?’

“But seriously, leg-by-leg I pulled him back and started to believe.

“I looked up at the big set to see it was 2-2 and 2-2. I wasn’t even aware it was going to a tie-break.

“It’s such an incredible feeling and there’s no limit to where I can go.

“If you can get through a game like that against the world number 26 then you can beat anyone.

“But let’s look at the next game.

“The next guy has to play me, I don’t have to play them.

“I’m here on a free run.”