I've just got home from work to see that Mensur Suljovic has defeated James Wade 8-6 in the first game of the Premier League's post-Barney cash in stage.
Wait, what? Whatever happened to the best of 12 legs that was the situation in the first stage of the event, as it was played the last season, and when was this decision made? Literally the first time I knew of this change for certain was five minutes ago, listening to the Weekly Dartscast (which has got a couple of great interviews with Keegan Brown and a prominent PDC manager, check it out) they mentioned that it might be extended, but weren't sure and did their predictions based on it being best of 12 legs.
This isn't on as far as I'm concerned. It's a league, and you can't really have different formats of match counting for the same number of points - in a knockout tournament it's fine, the slates are wiped clean after each round for all intents and purposes. But you can't really do this in a league structure, particularly seemingly on next to no notice whatsoever and changing rules midway through a season. What'd have happened if Mensur had have celebrated when he pinned D8 for his ten darter to lead 7-4? That's not unrealistic, who can forget Joe Murnan not knowing when sudden death started against Andy Hamilton in the worlds, or, for that matter, whoever the ref was in Reyes/Newton 1 not knowing how the rules worked. And he's the referee!
I'm all for giving the fans more darts, but you've got to have a bit of integrity in your events. Have what I've seen suggested, probably by Burton, in having an extra "contenders" game before the real games start in phase two. I'll stop now, as I shouldn't get too irritated by exhibitions.
No comments:
Post a Comment