Last Saturday saw a fantastic turn out for the Keith Goucher Classic Ranking Singles event held at the home of Andover Invitation Darts, the Wolversdene Club.

Fifty darters entered, which was a great response considering there was also a competition in Reading at the same time and it was electric from start to finish and was an epic day of darts writes Mark Thorne.

Board one winner was Swindon’s Tony Moulden who beat Hampshire’s Paul Gibb’s 4-0 in the board final , On board two a great contest early on between Hatty Raynsford and ex-Academy Karl Brooks was superb to watch and Brooks came out a 4-3 winner and at the latter stages Swindon’s Dave Wicks beat Hampshire’s Chas Barstow 4-3 in final.

Over on board three former Andover Darts chairman Glen Dawkins played some quality darts against Swindon’s Lee Evans and although losing 2-4 Dawkins had his chances .

Another old Academy graduate Luke Goddard really didn’t seem he’d been away from the game as long as he has as he showed great character and maturity while competing on his board with wins over Swindon’s Trevor Higginson 4-2 and Logan Barnecut 4-1 before he eventually lost in the board final to Evans 4-1 who booked his place in the semi-finals .

On board four Mark Thorne lost 4-0 to Berkshire’s England international Paul Hogan after missing doubles in the first two legs to take the lead.

Amesbury’s new face Danny Short showed some fantastic form only to lose narrowly 3-4 to Swindon’s Richie North who unfortunately lost in the board final to Hogan 4-0.

In the first semi-final Hogan, who is just about winning every competition he enters at the moment, came out a 5-3 winner over Tony Moulden to book his place in the final. The second semi-final between Evans and Dave Wicks was an all-Swindon affair with at least five maximums hit, 21 140’s and ton plusses neither deserved to lose but Evans narrowly beat Wicks 5-4.

In the final Hogan (26.99) took an early lead against the throw only for Evans (28.02) to break back. Evans then took two more legs to lead 3-1 before Hogan hit an 11 dart finish to peg it back to 2-3.

However Evans was in fine form and completed a 5-2 win and back to back wins in all Andover competitions.

There was also a Plate competition for first round game losers to which Academy star Aaron Hedges was runner-up to Hampshire’s Dan Rosher.

Thorne aid later: “A big thanks goes to the Wolversdene for their continued support and also a massive thank you to Harriet Raynsford for running the Plate competition and to ten-year old Liam Whitehorn for all his help.

‘ It really was a fantastic day and everyone thoroughly enjoyed it.”

The next competition will be the 2 Person Event on Sunday July 25. Contact Mark Thorne or Glen Dawkins to be registered with your partner’s name.