"It was definitely premeditated" - Joe Cullen honest about storming out of World Darts Championship press conference citing disrespect

Joe Cullen went down 4-3 against Gerwyn Price in the third round after one of the most spectacular matches at the recent PDC World Darts Championship. Ahead of the 2025 season getting underway, "The Rockstar" is taking on a very special challenge. He is going to climb the highest mountain in Africa.

Cullen will not be spending many days at the darts board in the coming weeks; on the contrary, he will be climbing Mount Kilimanjaro. "To my knowledge, I might be wrong, but to my knowledge no one has ever thrown darts at the top of Kilimanjaro," Cullen told Metro. "Winmau’s main dartboard factory is in Kenya. Apparently on a clear day you can see the top of Kilimanjaro from there. They’re sending some bits over so we’re going to set a dartboard up at the top."

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Cullen isn't just climbing for his own amusement though, with a very important cause, raising money for Andy's Man's Club, his main focus of the expedition. "Me and my wife own a cafe in Wyke and we’ve got a charity box in there for Andy’s Man’s Club, a couple of guys who run local meetings come in all the time," he explains of how the suicide prevention charity is close to his heart. "I thought I’d earn some money for them while I do it. I lost one of my best friends Rob to suicide four years ago in March. Just by coincidence the day I’m starting is his birthday, so hopefully I can earn a few quid for a good cause."

Joe Cullen in action at the past World Darts Championship 

Cullen is honest about his lack of preparation for the climb however. "I’ve done nothing!" Cullen admits. "I had a week in Tenerife last week on the piss, because obviously I lost in the Worlds. I went in an altitude chamber last night and the night before. We were walking at 1mph on the treadmill, you don’t break sweat or anything. I was bored, I went and got my iPad and watched Spurs v Liverpool. Three hours we were in there!"

"One of the boys I’m doing it with was saying he stopped drinking at the start of November, he’s been doing hill training once a week. I’ve done nothing!" Cullen adds. "The actual physical side of it isn’t that bad. You have to walk really slowly because of the altitude. It’s more mental and how you adapt to different levels of altitude."

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Cullen also looks back on the past World Darts Championship. He caused headlines there when he stormed out of his post-match press conference following his second-round victory over Wessel Nijman, seething at a perceived disrespect from the media. "I think the first game, I can’t remember ever being that wound up and up for the game. It wasn’t anything to do with Wessel or the bookies, but more the media," reflects the 35-year-old Englishman.

"Some people I know, they’re not friends but I’ve spent a lot of time with them and they wrote me off based on him having a good four months at the back end of the year. He’d never won a game at the Worlds before and I think it was my 14th Worlds, so I was like, really?" Cullen concludes. "It [leaving the press conference] was definitely premeditated. I was speaking to my wife, I knew I was going to win, so I said: 'When I win, get my bag ready.'”

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