Fettercairn set to host European Open Darts

The JDC Irish Open and European Open Darts tournaments are being held in the Fettercairn Community Centre this weekend.

The championships are run by the Junior Darts Corporation, the governing body for underage Darts and are open to players between the ages of 10-18.

The weekend will see the Irish and European Open run concurrently at the same time with participants in the Irish Open also being allowed to compete in the European tournament.

There are expected to be around 45 young Irish darts players competing this weekend with approximately 140 total entrants from all different countries expected.

JDC Eire Director Brian Doherty spoke of how darts has only been going from strength to strength in recent years.

“That’s been going on for a good few years, Luke Littler actually came from the JDC academies in England. With him coming on the scene it did increase it a good bit. He has been good for the sport.”

Entrants are selected via their performances in their JDC academies which are located in various places all over the country, there are 16 in total.

The kids will do a set routine every week and their scores are sent to the JDC head office.

Qualifying is done over the eight weeks and scores are taken for that time period, six times a year.

Finishing at the top of your eight week block will push you into the next category for the next cycle.

Similar to how martial arts belts progress in colour, darts medals do also with black being the penultimate colour before gold.

The tournament being held in Fettercairn this weekend is a gold level tournament with the best young players in this country and across Europe competing.

It is considered a Major and is being held in Tallaght after the success of a previous iteration in 2023.

Doherty spoke about how the JDC has grown hugely over the last five years or so.

“The JDC has blown up worldwide now. They’re in Australia, Mongolia, and New Zealand. There’s a team from Africa going to the World Cup this year in Gibraltar. It’s spread all over the world.”

The European Open will see players take part in four mini tournaments/events with whoever scoring the most points across all four winning the title, in comparison the Irish Open is just a traditional straight knock out format.

Plenty of local talent will be taking part in the event including Scott Doyle from Killinarden, Ryan McKenna from Firhouse, Paul Ryan of Fettercairn, Sean Madden from Saggart, Max Gallagher from Fettercairn, Lewis Cullen from Clondalkin, Sean McDermott from Clondalkin and Archie Goodwin from Saggart.