The tectonic plates of professional darts are shifting once more, and at the epicentre stands Barry Hearn, grinning like a man who has just watched prophecy turn into box office reality. The American experiment is no longer an experiment – it is an escalation.
For years, the US Darts Masters has occupied the more intimate surroundings of the Theater at Madison Square Garden, a room that holds somewhere between 2,000 and 5,600 spectators depending on configuration. Respectable. Atmospheric. Contained. But containment is no longer the ambition.
On the very first day tickets were released for this year’s World Series showcase, 6,000 seats evaporated into the New York air. Gone. Claimed. Devoured. That single statistic has detonated a far grander vision.
From 2027 onwards, darts will stride out of the theatre’s velvet shadow and into the cathedral itself – the full Garden arena, a colossus capable of housing roughly 19,500 roaring souls. Speaking to talkSPORT, Hearn could barely disguise the sense of manifest destiny.
“We went on sale in New York last week and we sold six thousand tickets on the first day at Madison Square Garden. Watch this space because next year we are going to come out of the Theater at Madison Square Garden and we are going to go into the full arena.
“If you had imagined that in your dreams ten years ago, would you ever see a sold-out Madison Square Garden – arguably the most famous stadium in the world – for darts in America?
“The answer is it’s coming. This sport has got personalities. I get darts players saying to me, ‘I have got ideas. These are ordinary guys who look like someone who lives around the corner to you.
“But they have extraordinary ability. Luke Littler, who won in Poland last night, is a great ambassador. Let’s hope they all stay sensible. Darts puts a smile on my face every time.”
And as the sport’s American crescendo builds, last year’s winner and current world number two, Luke Humphries will be hoping for another triumphant trip across the Atlantic and retaining his crown.
—–ENDS—–
Images: Matchroom / Ed Mulholland
