Players shine in capital contest

West Lothian players were on form as the Edinburgh Premier Darts League got underway and they recorded five wins from six games.

Armadale’s Scott Baillie was the odd man out, but even then his game went right down to the wire before he suffered a narrow 7-6 defeat in what was a fine performance in which he rattled in four sub- 20 dart legs.

Meanwhile, there were wins for Kieran Bird, Graeme Bird, William Borland, Rab Dick and Jim Mitchell, who scored a 7-0 whitewash that included a 15- dart leg as he got his Premier League campaign off to the best possible start.

Friday night saw the Bathgate League Doubles title on the line and it went down to the final leg, with the team of Jim Graham and Alan Gardiner winning the clash against William Borland and Kieran Bird in a keenly contested match at the Coppies Bar in Armadale.

Graham, along with lifting the trophy, was one of just three players to hit a 180 during the tournament, with Willie Wilson also getting his name on the maximums list while Paul Weir deserves a special mention for hitting two 180s on the day.

Weir then teamed-up with Rab Dick from Kirknewton in an open doubles tournament in Grangemouth on Sunday.

But the pair fell short of grabbing a West Lothian victory as they lost out in the final of the 5x701 event to the home pairing of Davie Kerwin and Jim Russell.

The final event in yet another packed week of darts came on Monday night as the West Calder and District Darts League hosted their three person team event at the Cawburn Sports Bar in Pumpherston.

There wasn’t much room for error in this competition, with a three- leg format that saw one game of 1001 triples and a game of 701 doubles with a singles match to decide the winner should the scores be tied after two legs.

After over two hours of play across the six boards, the teams were finally whittled down to the quarterfinals where there were wins for Commercial Inn Juniors, Cawburn Assassins A and B, and the Central Bar Rebels.

In the semi-finals, it was the two teams from Cawburn who prevailed against very strong opposition and it was the team of Graeme Bird and the Borland brothers, William and Graham, edging out Callum Wilkinson, Paul Weir and William Harraughty in the final to take the title.