It was the perfect setting. Whyte sparked out cold and you could hear a pin drop but for the sound of a lone Russian cornerman screaming at the top of his voice. Hearn and Bellew almost in tears and Bazza doing his nut that Eddie had fooked his garden up.
It must be one of those things that's only decent if you're there. Every time it comes on I'm like just get to the main event ffs. And pretty much everybody else in the live threads. They have milked it dry but it still keeps going. I wonder how much they pay for the rights.
The context was about the sport becoming stagnant since Matchroom took their eye off the domestic market for the DAZN deal, not about the sport. If you believe that's true, Matchroom's growth was driven by getting casuals in to watch nothing fights. People watching on Sky milked the atmosphere and wanted to attend. If you then watch boxing, or darts, or any other fairly niche sport sustained by television, without the crowd present, it's not the same at all. Attendances at boxing have declined since then and I'm making a simple argument that casuals just don't fancy it as much.
My local football team (the mighty St Johnstone) picked "Sweet Caroline" as its anthem in 2004 because it was the then-manager's favourite song. It got played before the game, on the supporters' buses, etc - and when we finally won something in 2014 it was a fitting tune for lifting the trophy. Nearly 20 years on it grinds my gears something rotten, and to have it taken over by mainstream sport makes it even worse, I wish we'd pick another song now!
I agree with you regarding Matchroom’s overarching strategy but I don’t think the fights were any less watchable and I’m very much a semi-casual. I actually liked it. The PDC darts “atmosphere” is shite. Just a bunch of pissheads. I’m very much in the Dennis Priestley camp, preferring “best of order”. Back before the pisshead push you had real darts fans in attendance and a great atmosphere. Now it’s just the pissheads, but it is obviously a clever rebrand from a financial perspective and the sport has grown in accordance. But from an entertainment perspective, from my seat, it’s certainly no more entertaining.
Darts was good a few years back but they’re going through the mid 2010 Matchroom phase of a load of bellends turning up to sing shite footy songs with no actual interest in the sport.
