PDC Chief Executive Matt Porter satisfied with crowds at PDC World Darts Championship: "The atmosphere was a lot more positive"
PDC
At the past PDC World Darts Championship, there was much to do about the action of Gerwyn Price who played during his quarterfinal against Gabriel Clemens with ear defenders on, to guard against the boos from the crowd.
However, PDC Chief Executive Matt Porter is pleased with the behavior of the fans.
"I think the atmosphere was a lot more positive this year rather than last year when it was a very, very pro-English crowd and there were quite a lot of political undertones because of the situation we were going through with COVID etc," Porter told the Love The Darts podcast.
"This year we had 10,000 Germans and Austrians, 5,000 Dutch, 5,000 travelling from the rest of the world so there was a real multi-cultural cosmopolitan mix amongst the crowd and that really helped the atmosphere.
"You could see on the pictures all the different flags of countries and I think that's great."
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While Gerwyn Price will feel hard done by, Porter believes that there are certain triggers to fans and players need to understand that and learn to live with it.
"It's an easy target to pick up on the boos and things like that, but I think you have to put it into context," Porter added. "It doesn't happen to every single player, it doesn't happen to any player all the time.
"But certain things can happen that can trigger the crowd and players have to understand that.
"They're up there playing for a lot of money, it's a high-pressured environment, people have to be able to deal with the pressure of competing in such circumstances.
"There have been occasions where it's boiled over, but for the majority of the time, it's been at a level the players are used to and capable of dealing with."
I am sorry porter , you are wrong. The booing , jeering , whistling of players gets worse and MORE partisan every single year, I have absolutely no doubt you ,and the rest of the PDC management love it. (I do wonder when you will attempt to lessen it, when a fight breaks out in the crowd, as in the boxing ?) However , as a darts player i can understand Gerwyn Prices ( and he is NOT the only one) who thinks it has gone too far. The booing and jeering as these players attempt the final shot outs is disgraceful and i would not mind betting ,porter , has never played a competitive game of darts in his life!!
he's right it was a huge improvement on last year, although that was a very low bar to clear.
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