Rod Harrington was a former World Master and two time World Matchplay winner but it could have been so much different it seems if it wasn't for Kevin Painter.

Harrington spoke to the Weekly Dartscast as part of their Darts Legends series about a challenge match which he had with 'The Artist' which proved a catalyst.

"It was a local pub. I lived in a very small village and the local pub was the Harp and everyone was playing darts. Back then I did play Super League and the odd county game but I weren't serious. I met my wife, we started to have children so I didn't really play darts till I was 32 or 33 then we took on a bar.

One of Kevin Painter's mates came in mouthing it off about how good Kevin was. I said 'tell him to come back in a month's time and I'll play him for £500!' which Kevin did, I beat him and then we went over to his place because he only lived at Tiptree at the time and he beat me over there.

"I just started playing Super League again so we kind of ended up practice partners and that's when I started playing tournaments so if I hadn't have had that challenge match with Kevin Painter had I have gone on to make it as a pro, I don't know"

https://twitter.com/WeeklyDartscast/status/1277956182888628230?s=20